Great Songs Have Multiple Lives

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Great songs can have multiple lives.

When they come into our lives the first time, they are fully formed. The melody, the chords, the lyrics, the production. They cast themselves - cement themselves - in our collective consciousness, more often than not, affixing themselves to a particular point in time, a feeling, an emotion.

But what makes the song great isn't any sort of superficial treatment. It isn't the production, or the use of a synthesizer, or a particular type of guitar.

It's the underlying melody, the honesty, the feeling. Which transcends the superficial.

Which is why if you take a great song, and strip away the fancy production work to, say, simply a voice and guitar, it still retains its magic.

And when you then push it in a different direction (alter the arrangement, for example, slow it down), it transforms once again, without losing its individuality, its magic.

Because great songs, at their core, are about a purity of intent, a clarity of message, an honesty of emotion.

Which is what allows them to have a life beyond the 'original'.