Page 83 - Song Maps - A New System to Write Your Best Lyrics - Simon Hawkins

I once wrote a song called "Before Christ" with my wonderful friend and co-writer Sue C Smith in which we extracted three meanings out of the same title, set up by two short Verses and a two-line Bridge. The three meanings were:
1. A long time ago (before Christ = B.C.)
2. A place (before Christ = in heaven)
3. An act of worship (before Christ = bowing before Christ)
The key for us making the Chorus work was to make it very simple: Title
Title
Another line
Title
And the other line was a very generic but still meaningful "What a world of difference."
But there are many ways you can go about crafting a Twist lyric. Often it's about waiting for the right idea to fall in your path and, when it does, being quick to recognize it and capture it.
What does the Twist look like?
The Twist Map below applies to a word or phrase twist. This simply sets up the title (the word or phrase of the twist) from two or more perspectives in each of the Verses. To deliver this requires some thought as to how to set up the twist when it arrives in the Chorus.
The neat thing about this Map is that given the very different approaches to the same word or phrase, we know that the Chorus will be "recolored" with each Verse, helping to move the lyric forward with each section.
The Twist can be represented as follows: