Saturday 5 December 2009

Lyrical Issue

I'm trying to write some lyrics, and I've hit upon a problem...

I wrote a line which included "different to" - of course, this is incorrect...  Anyone but a moron knows it ought to be "different from"...!  I despise this mistake - along with the other obvious issues of less/fewer, if I was/were, etc - and was horrified to see that I'd written it myself...

However, there is a reason for this...  The song I'm trying to write isn't particularly slow, so with "different from" you end up getting two "fr" sounds in quick succession...  It's harder to sing, and it sounds more clumsy, than "different to" which seems to scan much better as a lyric...  Natural, as a lyricist, I want to write verses that flow, sound pleasing and are nice to sing...  But, I couldn't bear to think I'd written a grammatical error into one of my songs, and allowed it to stay there, like an un-Bazooka-ed verruca...!

So now, there is a battle, between my inner artist, and my inner grammar pedant...  They're not just having a fight - they're actually jousting!  In my head!  Horses, lances, suits of armour - the lot...!!  And it's giving me a headache...  Maybe I should give the songwriting a break, and try and get some sleep?!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Definitely "different from". But of course the Americans also say "different than". Had you considered that one?

Anonymous said...

Also, why on earth do the comments come out in black text on a black background????? Not much point in commenting if it's completely unreadable! Perhaps you can change your colour scheme so that comments can be read? But then again, you probably can't actually read this suggestion, so nothing will change because you will remain unaware of the problem! Oh dear...

Kit Marsden said...

Rory, this problem is F.I.X.E.D.
Hurrah...!!

Sam said...

Which problem was fixed, you took her lyric suggestion or changing the comment color scheme? I know the color scheme has been changed since you answered, but I would never know if it was because of this comment or just an update to the blog in the last 10 months. Okay, I'm actually not that curious, but I'm on a commenting spree over here and wanted to say something.

Post a Comment

Feel free to leave a comment - give your feedback, answer a question, start a debate, make a point, or simply hurl abuse... It's up to you! ;)