Q: I accidentally came up with a super cool melody with awesome chords... but no lyrics. What do you recommend I do here? I worry that anything I come up with will feel forced
A: it's there. if the melody and chords really are super cool, then there is a lyricized version that does work. there are a few tricks to help hone in on it. gather the tiny details that you think you know, or almost know. For example: maybe you know a certain word works really well for part of it, for example let's say the word 'banana' just sounds perfect for the last part of it. Or, maybe you know banana sounds great for that part but you doubt it should be about bananas. Add that factoid to your list of factoids, regardless. write down that you love the word banana at the end but you're not sure if it could work. See if you can hone in on any other things you know, about other tiny parts of it. What can you rule out? what can you rule in? Here's another exercise: just start coming up with as many phoenecically functional things as possible that fit, without regard for what you want it to mean. This will help you notice things: for example you might notice that 80% of the results are phrased as a question. You may notice that these 2 little notes there are always either "in the" or "and it". You may notice that certain phrases keep fitting a certain part, over and over. Now, on the other side of the coin, here's a totally different exercise to try: paraphrase the whole feeling of it, without the melody. so just write down, in as many words as you like, what you think the melody is saying, without worrying about how many words or syllables you use. anything you can grasp onto. maybe you think it has a feeling of freshness. maybe you think it has a feeling of 'morning'. maybe you think it has a feeling of sorrow. maybe you think it has a feeling of good news. write down as much as you can about what you think the melody feels like. Then, maybe certain key words will pop out at you that possibly DO fit. And most importantly, regardless of whether any of this works, going through all this makes it much more likely that the answer will actually just fall on your head later when you're not even thinking about it