Echoes of Time: A Songwriter's Dance Through Past, Present, and Dreams

Ah, the tapestry of time – My greatest quest and a boundless canvas for us songwriters to paint our stories upon. If you have even dipped a mere pinky in the universe of Eternalramblings then you have come across my maddening obsession with unravelling the mysteries of time. From physics to music to writing words, the complexity of time has kept me awake for too long. Now, picture this: we're sitting at a café, you and I, sipping on our favorite brew (I have a favorite hidden coffee place, if you wanna try it out!) , and I'm about to unravel the secrets of using different time perspectives to craft a narrative for your song that'll resonate like a cherished memory. There yet? Let’s travel through time! (*insert sci-fi sound effects*)

Past Tense: Let's start at the very beginning, a very good place to start

Imagine there's no heaven, wait no!, imagine the past as a well-worn vinyl record, crackling with the echoes of yesteryears. This is where memories and experiences live, propagate, transmute and transform. One crucial lesson I have learnt is that past is never permanent but it’s always evolving, building itself, adding little details, changing little details, which cascade into creating a whole new memory. You really can't trust your memories, you make tiny changes every time you think about it again.

When you embrace the past tense in your songwriting, you invite your listeners to step into a time machine and revisit moments they hold dear or fear. You allow them to process these bygone feelings maybe in a new light, maybe as they are, maybe you help them mould it into something new altogether. Think of it as conjuring the ghosts of emotion – the heartache of lost love, the euphoria of a long-lost summer and adding more details. It’s a very powerful tool which when used right can make a song powerful enough to change someone’s life and their relationship with their own past.

Consider "Yesterday" by The Beatles and the crowd favourite “Summer of 69” by Bryan Adams. In “Yesterday”, McCartney's tender ballad is a masterclass in the past tense. He takes us back to a simpler time, lamenting what's slipped through his fingers and now is gone. Beatles had numerous songs that exploited this time perspective effectively, “Eleanor Rigby”, “Norwegian Wood” to name some of my personal favourites. The lyrics, "Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away," create an instant connection to the bittersweet ache of memories. Similarly, “Summer of 69” works its magic to all people irrespective of their existence in the year ‘69 (no innuendo here, move on). It evokes the feeling of youth, love and simpler life. Some other examples are, “Somebody that I used to know” by Gotye, and “Paradise” by Coldplay. Even some of my own songs are stories from my past, but I am more of a live in the present kinda person so most of my songwriting is of the following nature...

Present Tense: Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, and today is a gift, that's why they call it present

Now (pun intended), let's talk about the present tense. It's the immediate, unfiltered lens through which we experience life's intensity. This second, this very moment you are peering at your screen at these words is where we can tell our story and make people live it. When you employ the present tense in your lyrics, you're like a journalist reporting live from the frontlines of human experience. You're right there, in the thick of it, capturing every raw emotion. Every fine detail without filters. Some of the best songs in the present tense, transport you into the world of song and make you live it through your own eyes. (We will discuss more on using view-perspectives in songwriting soon, from close up monologue to wide angle shot as a narrator).

You can find numerous songs using present tense since they are all about the immediate raw vulnerability and emotion. Some of my favourite examples are: “Don’t stop me now” by Queen, “Cheers Darlin’” by Damien Rice, “Just the way you are” by Bruno Mars, “Levitating” by Dua Lipa, “Uptown Girl” by Billy Joel, and one of my secret saves, “Way back into love” by Hugh Grant and Drew Barrymore. I absolutely love this last track.

Most of KAPOW! songs utilise the present tense perspective with some jumping back and forth (which we'll get into soon), simply because I find the present tense writing most compelling.

Future Tense: There was a young lady named Bright, whose speed was far faster than light; She set out one day, in a relative way, and returned on the previous night.

Welcome to the future tense – a canvas of dreams, aspirations, alternate realities, dystopian worlds and robot uprisings. Here you can channel all your multiverse fantasies, build your own worlds and be its God too. This is the realm of what could be, the hopes and desires that propel you or your character forward. It's like staring at a starry night, imagining the constellations of what's to come. Giving it a name and a story. You can peer at the present and past too from the future with a different air.

Consider Taylor Swift's "Love Story." In this modern-day Shakespearean tale, she spins a story of love destined to unfold, like pages from a fairy tale yet to be written. "Marry me, Juliet, you'll never have to be alone," she sings, inviting us to dream along with her and all of us did! ( if you don’t consider Taylor Swift, a great songwriter, we are already in trouble. Her songs are now a course in writing. more than 6 universities offer a course on her and rightly so, we have a lot to learn from her). Some other examples include: “Fix you” by Coldplay, “Imagine” by John Lennon, “Hall of fame” by The Script.

If you are still a non-believer, here's the proof:

THE LAST TIME BENDER: Create your own Grandfather paradox

But my dear songsmith, the true magic lies in blending these tenses, ‘cause this is where things start to get interesting. All the time bending, time travelling shenanigans much like Murakami blends reality and the surreal in his novels.

Imagine a song that starts in the past, winds through the present, and soars into the future. It's like a time-traveling troubadour, weaving a narrative that transcends the boundaries of mere moments.Or you can pull a Benjamin Button on the entire thing and go from future to present to past. But that's just old boring linear time thinking.

Let's dive into the realm of non-linear time, shall we? You can establish your verses in the past with choruses bringing the listeners to present, add a bridge in the future before coming back to present in the outro. A simple, yet unique recipe to make your song stand out. The permutations and combinations are only confined by your imagination.

Write a song entirely in the future with the bridge in past, showing the motivation of your characters or the events that led to this future of yours.

Why not, and hear me out, create a song that is about two different timelines, where past events in one influence the future in the other and so you jump from this timeline B to timeline A and change a major event but to your horror it creates a third timeline which is heavily influenced by the present of the timeline B and I'm not making any sense am I? I'll let you figure out this one...

Some beautiful examples of this cocktail of time are

1. Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen

2. Someone like you by Adele

3. Hotel California by The Eagles

Letter from the future

It's the year 3008 and I am a digitised version of Eternalramblings which was created by uploading his consciousness to an immortality device that keeps his brain alive. In my future you have become a successful songwriter, your songs have really stood the test of time it seems. in the year 2102, you were awarded the Nobel in Literature for expanding human understanding and expression of time through your music and lyrics. In your acceptance speech you thanked Eternalramblings for the immensely powerful tools he provided you to achieve this goal.