Mark Clark said "A good song tells me something about myself." Once on another forum I said I though the difference between music and noise was that music was noise that seemed to telling us something about ourselves. Hm, getting the two together must be the thing.

   But--unless someone tells you the song is about their own personal experience, how does one know to squirm? I like the idea of using fictional "I" and squirm, at least over one song, at the thought I'll be identified with the character. I like the idea of making some experiences or concerns a little bigger, or stranger, than they might be in my own experience. But that probably goes to another thread.

About "universal" songs, I remember being put off one night at a coffeehouse when a guy told me his group up next were going to play "standards" and wouldn't name a tune beyond that. I knew they played jazz, standards, sure, but... well, okay, "standards." I don't know. To me they're still songs. And it may be part of the two types of jazz as I hear it, cat-jazz, which has some reserve, some smarts, still serves the tune, knows when to quit, or the dog-jazz that goes on panting with it's tongue hanging out through endless solos, ad nauseum.