analyze a song about California
Description
Your intro paragraph provides us with a lot of context and background but doesn’t yet tie it to a “thesis statement,” or what you will discuss is California’s image that this song creates. Your lyric paragraph is missing an actual complete lyric; remember, you can choose up to 2 long or 4 short consecutive lines. Your intro says that the song portrays California’s lifestyle as a kind of “beef” between the west and east coast, are there places within the lyrics that can help you show this? But in your lyric paragraph, you discuss California being a party state. I suggest focusing on one interpretation throughout the paper. For example, if you want to stick to a party state’s idea, can you tell us specifically what type of party it is? Who does it appeal to? How can you tell? Pick something that you think the song is saying, and choose lyrics that are a little bit more obscure and allow you to explain them to your reader. Third paragraph Your sound paragraph gives us a lot of description about the song, but it doesn’t yet tie it to an image. Can you isolate two or three things that directly show how a specific sound creates California’s particular image? For example, you mention using an excessive amount of autotune, which sounds like a robot, can you connect this to the “image”? i.e., is California futuristic? This is only an example, and you would have to use something that connects to the image you are claiming the song creates. Your last paragraph tells us a bit about the song that you’ve already mentioned. Remember to tell us what YOU think about the song and what you want us to know about it that perhaps you didn’t get a chance to talk about in your earlier paragraphs fully. I suggest isolating your lyrics and isolating your sounds and “discovering” what image of California the song creates, and then returning and using this as your thesis statement.
