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Written by: Jeff Oxenford (© 2004)

Performed by: Jeff Oxenford

Inspiration

It’s hard not to be inspired during a political season. After most political commercials, I want to vote for "none of the above". It’s amazing to me how little we know about the people we elect to political office. How often do we look at their resumes? What kind of reference check do we perform? In most cases, we rely on the media and a few sound bites to make our decision.

My brother is an attorney who reviews political ads and advices campaigns on whether  they may be sued. I can ony imagine the ads he advises not using.

Process

In writing a good political song, I was told that it’s important to take shots at both sides, not be in your face about such and such is a jerk (I have those songs also). So I wrote the lyrics such that they could come from any candidate (unfortunately they do come from all). In the chorus, I originally used 15 seconds, but upon learning more, I found that the average commercial is 30 seconds.

For the music, I just used basic chords in the key of C. Since the song was to make a point, I didn’t want the music to get in the way.  I did add a bridge after getting feedback during songwriters section, so the final song structure is:

V, V, C, V, V, C, B, C