Have you ever noticed how some people can describe a simple, everyday event and make it sound hilarious or tragic or just plain interesting, while another person can tell the same story and have you snoring with boredom in an instant?
If the language you use to tell a story is vivid and fresh even a familiar experience or idea can come to life, but if you’re talking in overused, predictable phrases—in other words, if you’re using clichés—the most exciting story can become dull. It’s all in the words you choose.
People often speak in clichés
Clichés are familiar phrases that have become an acceptable shorthand way of expressing an idea: “Time flies!” “Love is blind.” “He’s full of hot air.” “You can count on me.” On the plus side, everyone understands what you mean. But these phrases are so familiar and overused they’ve lost their emotional impact. The result is bland, forgettable language. For example, here’s a description of a workday that’s filled with clichés.
- I got up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. My cup of coffee tasted like mud. On the bus, people were packed like sardines. My boss was hopping mad when I got to work late. The day seemed to drag on and on. I thought six o’clock would never come!
While this paragraph gives you an idea of what the speaker’s day was like, it doesn’t make you feel the boredom and frustration. Familiar phrases such as “packed like sardines,” “hopping mad” and “seemed to drag on and on” have been used so many times listeners no longer picture the images, experience the sensation, or notice the comparison; they don’t feel the crush of bodies on the bus or picture the boss hopping up and down in anger. In fact, listeners barely even hear clichés at all. They’re wasted space in your song unless you do something to change that.
Give your clichés new life.
1. Use a fresh or unexpected comparison
Comparisons are a great way to add energy to a description. There was a time when “packed like sardines” was vivid, fresh, and funny. Listeners really pictured it when they heard it and it made them react. Eventually, so many people liked it and used it that the idea became stale and listeners stopped reacting.
You can create new comparisons that associate one idea with another in ways listeners haven’t heard before. For instance, you could describe a crowded bus like this: “People were wedged together like pieces in a jigsaw puzzle.” Or you could express exhaustion by saying, “I felt like a balloon that was losing air. Floating an inch off the ground, being kicked around.”
A “broken heart” is a common lyric cliché. To give it new life and make listeners feel it, you could compare it to other breakable objects: “My heart shattered like glass.” Or use words that suggest breaking or tearing: “All I’ve got are the jagged pieces of a heart.”
When faced with a cliché, try making a list of objects, descriptors, or physical sensations you could use as fresh comparisons.
2. Make it a character
When you give human characteristics to an inanimate object, it literally brings it to life for listeners. In Beyoncés hit “Halo” she sings:
Remember those walls I built?
Well, baby, they’re tumbling down
And they didn’t even put up a fight
They didn’t even make a sound.
Putting up a wall to protect our feelings is a bit of a cliché; we’ve all heard it before. But here the walls are humanized: they don’t put up a fight, they don’t make a sound. It’s a clever way to turn this cliché into something fresh and interesting.
3. Twist a cliché
Give a cliché more punch by surprising the listener. Create a different payoff at the end or explain it in a way that offers a new insight. Instead of “the day dragged on and on,” you might try, “the day dragged on and dragged me down.” In his song “Real Peach,” Henry Jamison starts with a cliché—If all is fair in love and war— then adds an unexpected payoff line—then I don’t know what we are fighting for. It makes you stop and think about the cliché and its consequences.
The Cliché Game
Rewrite these clichés using any or all of the techniques listed above.
- I depend on you; you’re my ace in the hole.
- You think you’re the one on top, but soon you’ll change your tune.
- We fight like cats and dogs but things work out in the end.
- Any friend of yours is a friend of mine.
- I’m following in your footsteps.
- My love will last forever and a day.
Find more clichés online at web sites like ClicheSite.com. Practice rewriting them to get in the habit and exercise your creative muscle. Keep a list of your rewritten lines and refer to it next time you’re looking for a song title or idea. Use one of your rewritten clichés as the basis for a song lyric.