Hooks

How to write a hook people can't shake

A hook is the smallest usable piece of a song — the bit a stranger hums a week later. Get the hook right and the rest of the record has somewhere to go.

1. The six-word rule

Almost every hook that has ever worked fits in six words or fewer. "I want to break free." "Sweet dreams are made of this." "Rolling in the deep." Constrain the length before you write the melody — it forces you to make the words carry weight.

2. Rhythm first, pitch second

A hook is a rhythmic pattern before it is a melody. Tap the syllables on a table. If the rhythm alone has personality — syncopation, a pause, a swing — the melody will land whatever pitches you choose. Boring rhythm, boring hook.

3. One idea, said one way

The hook is not the place to be nuanced. Say one thing, in one register, once. Save the second idea for the verse or the bridge. A hook trying to do two jobs usually does neither.

4. Test it against silence

Sing the hook a cappella. No guitar, no beat, no production tricks. If it still feels inevitable with nothing behind it, you have a hook. If it needs the track to hold it up, it is a hook-shaped hole, not a hook.

5. Put it early, then again, then again

The modern listener decides in under fifteen seconds. Don't hide the hook behind a long intro. Place it inside the first thirty seconds and repeat it as an earworm at least three times across the record.

"A hook is a promise the rest of the song has to keep."