Dear Chris Sligh,

I find it strange that the song you co-wrote, "Here Comes Goodbye," went to the top of the music charts. Of course, if it had gone to the top of the Bland Cliché charts, I'd understand.

I was sitting in the dentist office waiting to have two cavities filled, cavities that developed despite the fact I brush and floss every day, which, I might add, did not improve my gum scores dramatically or even matter-of-factly, so why did I make such an effort... I'm sorry; I'm telling you about your song. So I was sitting there when your song was played on the subscription music service - called Mind-Numbing Background Softies, I think - and while I probably wouldn't have noticed it at all had there been even one other thing on my mind, in truth, I was just staring at a wall; so your song actually made it to my brain.

I kind a wish it hadn't, but it does give me a good opportunity to offer you some help. Now, you're going to say, "Why do I need help? I had no trouble finding a boring, three-piece band with a whining, narrow-ranged lead singer to record my song; and it did go to #1. Besides, you don't have a #1 single, do you?" Well, those are good points all, but consider for a moment who will listen to your music when all the healthcare patients are no longer subject to it? Probably no one. You see, writing a good song is worth it because people want to hear it, in many forms, for years and years.

Let's look at your lyrics. The way you started out isn't really too bad. Maybe that's because you didn't write that part; I don't know. A dude's chica is coming up the driveway and she's acting weird, so he's pretty sure she's going to dump him. Fine so far. But then something happens to the imagery in the song. You could say it goes "from good to gone."

Don't get me wrong, I'm sure "Here comes the pain" absolutely blows some people over, and they know exactly what you mean. For me, though, it's more like looking through the thesaurus for negative emotional sensations. You could have used hurt - or ache, pang, prick, sting, tingle, twinge, discomfort, distress, soreness, agony, anguish, misery, suffering, torment, torture, inflammation, swelling, damage, harm, or injury - and achieved just as little. But most of those aren't one-syllable words, and "Here comes the swelling," just doesn't sound right. So you probably did the best you could.

I'm now going to ask you a few, possibly difficult, but important questions you should probably have asked yourself before showing these lyrics to anyone else.
1. Is there anything novel, creative, poetic, or original in these lyrics?
2. Does the narrator have the emotional maturity of a ninth grader, or is he more at that hard-to-describe level of the summer after ninth grade?
3. Could the narrator have seen this coming?
4. Does the girlfriend only come over at night? Is that why turning the light on is such a big deal?
5. Will the narrator ever recover and go to college, perhaps meet other women?
6. What does the word maudlin mean?

After answering each one, you should have a better understanding of why your song is a bit light on, some might say completely devoid of, meaning or noteworthiness. I dare say everyone who's reached age 15 has felt some sort of "pain." I'm sure we've felt nothing like the hopeless abyss of your narrator, but then, you never get around to telling us anything about him or his feelings; so I guess I wouldn't know.

From now on, when your trying to write lyrics, imagine yourself in your doctor's office. You say, "Doctor, I'm sick." He says, "Okay, what's wrong?"
"I don't know, that's why I came to you."
"But what sort of symptoms are you experiencing? Any pain?"
"Oh, yes, pain like I've never felt before."
"Where?"
"In my body."
"Um... what is it that hurts?"
"Doc, all I can think about is yesterday, when I was so healthy. Now I'm sicker than I can ever tell you. I just never thought this could happen to me."
Make sense? Just read it again, then.

A small point on grammar: in a conditional sentence, you need to use the conditional mood in the verb phrase. Therefore, one wishes she were right here in one's arms, not was. Also, you really shouldn't use an objective case pronoun in a subjective phrase. "Here comes me..." Does that make sense to you? Alas, I nitpick.

Sometimes horrible lyrics are redeemed by a fantastic melody. So I figured I'd better listen to your tune again, since I couldn't remember it in the least. I found the song on a music-streaming website, along with a few other songs by the same title. Those songs were all better than yours, at least I could get through them, but that's not the point. Hmm... point. That's an apt word. It means the part that sticks you. That's what your melody doesn't have. If you bent a point over on itself, you'd have a hook. Your melody doesn't have one of those either.

Alright, so you're probably asking, "Are you picking on me just because my hair is so dreadful?" That's part of it, but it's mostly because I don't want to have to sit through music like yours again. Still, it's probably not worth my time to critique your song. After all, you've positioned yourself as an adult contemporary/Christian artist. Those two genres offer something like 99.44% pure mashed potatoes as the sole dish on the musical menu. I don't think your songs could make those genres any more bland. Anyway, you're not likely to listen to me since your song is doing well on the radio. But, as you say, "Nothing's on the radio."