How to write a hit pop song that is popular for 100 years.

What Closing Time and Happy Birthday have in common.

This isn’t the kind of stuff I usually write about. But I thought it would be interesting as someone who has written a number¹ of hit pop songs to share some of my insight on how to write the kind of song that outlives you as an artist. The kind of song that is still on playlists long after people have forgotten who you are.

One thing that helps with this, is to not be too big of a star yourself. Luckily, most of the people reading this will fall into that category… no offense. But it’s easier for your song to outshine you if you don’t have that much shine yourself. For people like Beyonce or Taylor Swift or even The Beatles, although their hits are massive, they are still bigger. Time will tell if their songs outlive them. Will there be a time when people know the song “Single Ladies” but it’s an obscure piece of music nerd trivia if you know the artist? Unlikely.

Anyways, the song that is inspiring this post is the song Closing Time by Semisonic. Everyone knows the song. Few under the age of 35 know the band. The song is still played frequently in bars at the end of the night nearly 30 years after the songs release. This song has staying power. And it holds a dear place in my heart because I may or may not have helped to write the song².

So why is Closing Time still around and frequently played when so many others from the time period have been forgotten to the dustbin of history? It’s because it owns a moment. In the same way that Mariah Carey’s net worth doubles every holiday season, Semisonic owns the “hey guys, last call” we’re-turning-the-lights-on moment at every bar in America. That is their Christmas. And what’s great for them, unlike Mariah Carey, is that the moment has very little competition. Mariah Carey has to share with Michael Bublé and Bing Crosby. When the barkeep is beginning to load the dishwasher it’s all Semisonic.

So how do you replicate this? You obviously need your own cultural moment to own with your song. A moment that will outlast you, like Christmas, but not Christmas because that is super crowded. Also you don’t want to do weddings. You aren’t going to compete with Bruno Mars, Ed Sheeran or somehow Walk The Moon who from my experience seem to be locked into the wedding circuit for the next few decades with Shut Up and Dance.

No, you need to pick a moment that no one is paying attention to but everyone experiences. Notice how Semisonic made a song about the end of the night, the boring part where everyone has to go home. Obviously more fun to write about starting the night or middle of the party when everyone is doing shots. But that is what everyone does. They zigged when everyone zagged.

So let’s look at some universal life moments and see where your big pop song can go.

Birthdays

So obviously Happy Birthday is the real banger here. Written in 1890 by Patty and Mildred J Hill, this one has now passed the point of being a hit for an entire century. Also a good example of the original artist being a deep cut trivia nerd thing to know.

But there are others that get their shine as well. Birthday Sex by Jeremih seems to make its way on to many Instagram stories by people who are looking to project that their birthdays are a bit more risqué. Jeremih is not famous, but his song is. This is the kind of niche you want to hit.

So what else do people do on birthdays? They cry. But that is covered already by Lesley Gore with “It’s My Party.” What about take the day off work or school? That seems like it could be an anthem. Free million bucks for you. Call up Max Martin and ask him to help you write a song on skipping school or work on your birthday and to make it really catchy. Boom! You’re welcome.

St. Patrick’s Day

Okay so with Christmas already locked down by a lot of big names. Maybe a win for you eked out in Birthdays as noted above. We have to drop to second tier holidays. But it can’t be 4th of July since that has like the National Anthem or whatever and it can’t be like Columbus Day because people don’t really party on it. Let’s go with St. Patrick’s day, which is a party holiday without an anthem.

(Given how I look I don’t think I can write the Cinco de Mayo or Juneteenth anthems, but maybe you can.)

For competition, it’s light. We have The Dropkick Murphys. But like this is kind of “scare the hoes” music that isn’t making it into hot girl instagram stories.

This is like a jam for guys who rock mutton chops, wear paddy caps, and like throwing bows when they see live music. St. Patrick’s Day in my city is a lot like SantaCon. Its young people in cheap costumes from Amazon getting really drunk and then ending the “night” with egregious PDA (usually fingering) or vomitting or both on a curb, while the sun is still up.

I think this holiday needs a fun sexual diddy a la Sabrina Carpenter that gets people in the mood for a random green and blurry hook up. It can play at every girls pregame as they put shamrock shaped glitter under their eyes. You can have the St. Patrick’s day anthem.

First Day of School

Someone that used the same strategy as Semisonic was Vitamin C with Graduation. She is not a big star, her name is not uttered much these days, but her song is still played at many a May party while 18 year olds hug each other and cry.

So while the end of school has its defining pop song, I am not aware of a universal first day of school jam. I think the people yearn for a perennial September bop. Green field opportunity. I would go a little more melancholic here. It’s autumn. Summer is ending. You have to go be in class. Hit that mood just right and you will be blasting headphones in the year 2100 of kids riding the hoverbus.

Being sick at home

This needs a whole album in fact. Everyone writes sad songs about heartbreak which are relatable like what, three times in your life if you are lucky? What about a song about being home sick? That happens like once or twice a year. Being sick is very complex emotionally. On one hand sometimes you kind of yearn for it. The little break from the day to day grind. An excuse from the heavens to just lay and do nothing. But then when you actually experience it you realize how much you were romanticizing it. You hurt. You are never the right temperature. You can’t breathe right. That soup you fantasized about, you can barely taste it. It’s this feeling of “why did I want this? Why did I want to ail?”

Songs are a great way to capture such complexities. Think Ne-Yo’s hit So Sick.

And how it captures that feeling of having a hurt (this time emotional) that kind of feels good to feel. A pain you can’t get enough of. Like when your tooth hurts and you keep purposely pressing it with your tongue.

If you can capture this feeling of being home and being sick and all the associated emotions then your next sick day may be spent bundled up on a Hastens, my friend.

Other ideas

A pre-game anthem. This is sort of the opposite of Closing Time. A hype song that is really focused on the time when people are putting ona. cute top, taking some shots, getting ready for the night out with close friends.

Moving time. Everyone knows the tropes of moving. You have a box of pizza. A six pack. A friend’s van or a U-Haul. Overalls splattered with paint for some reason. It needs a song.

Five O’Clock. People already say things like “It’s Five O’clock somewhere!” why isn’t there a song about when you start hearing people zip their bags in the office you maybe hear pop of a can of beer from the office fridge. There is probably some Jimmy Buffet or country song about this but it could use something a bit more aimed at the white collar demo.

How to think about this.

So now that I have given you a bunch of money-printing pop song ideas you may want to come up with some of your own. The things to consider are “how universal and frequent is this feeling I am capturing?” the more universal and the more frequent the better. That is why birthdays work so well, they happen every day.

The more specific the better. Good Charlotte released a song “The Anthem” in 2002. But the reason you don’t hear it much now-a-days is that I couldn’t really tell you what it’s an anthem for. We already have a National Anthem, so you need to at least be more narrow than that. Don’t be like Good Charlotte (or do, because one of them is married to Cameron Diaz I think).

And then lastly and least importantly, be a phenomenal instrumentalist, singer, and songwriter. People like songs that are about specific things happening in their life but they also like songs that are actually good to listen to.

Good luck out there! See you on the charts!

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1. zero is a number

2. the latter