my mosaic.

sometimes, you meet a person whose conversation is pretty much a string of sentences or phrases that have an exceptional habit of drawing you in.

In a song, the ‘hook’ is basically the part that reaches out, grabs into your mind, and gets you invested in the song. In a lot of pop, it contains the title, like when Bruno Mars goes “..because you’re amazing, Jusssst The Wayyy Youuu Are.” Think of an interesting conversation you’ve had recently. Is there one inside joke, or comment, or metaphor, something in that conversation that stuck in your mind and echoed nonstop for hours?

I’ve had the pleasure of meeting so many amazing, intellectual, witty, creative, diverse people in my young lifetime, but a small number have really gotten stuck in my head. I realized why, and tried explaining it to one of these catchy individuals.

You speak in hooks. You realize that? You know, the hook of a song. It’s catchy, intriguing, somewhat blunt, and gets the song stuck in your head. If our conversations were a song, and your words were the melody, more often than not, they’d be the hook.

In other words, banter with these hook-speakers is composed of, or summarized with, one liners and phrases that give you subtle closure on the topic, while keeping you invested. And they resound in your head, and you kinda want to write them down, just so you can read them out loud.

However, see, I’m thinking there’s a danger with this kind of conversationalist. If a song is supercatchy, you keep wanting to hear it, and it soon becomes overplayed, right? And if a song was all hooks, the listener would be very overwhelmed. There needs to be the in between, that’s more basic and straightforward. The words and tunes that aren’t what get you in, but they keep you there. They trickle and grow and build and resolve and carry you to your hook, so that it’s strong, and melodious, and generally unforgettable.

My personal opinion?

A hook is no good without verses.

A resolution is no good without a bridge.

& a catchy conversation is no good if nothing’s really being said.

words are their own kind of beauty and soldiers and art. let’s make them count.