Hi, Mark: Universal is a tough goal to shoot for, although admirable.
I remember talking with a folk singer (and a very successful one) who said, "I only sing universal songs,) and I thought to myself, yeah, "lah de dah!" It sounded a little pompous to me, because I'd heard the person's recordings and concerts, and there were a lot of songs the singer might have thought were "Universal" that didn't say a thing to me. I have to laugh at some of the songs that I've written that I thought were throw-aways, and never even wrote down, only to find that someone thought they were one of my best songs. No accounting for taste. The danger in trying to be "universal" for a songwriter is that it can lead you into writting things in such general terms that they become musical Hallmark cards. And, sometimes it sounds like the person sat down with beads of sweat on their forehead, saying "I'm going to write a universal song, if it kills me."

For me a good songwriter helps me to see the world through their eyes, with a freshness and difference of perspective that I might not have otherwise experienced. If I hear, and then sing Jam on Gerry's Rocks, for example, it transports me into a time and place where I've never been. It brings images to mind that are certainly not universal, but they are vivid in my mind. If you, or Mary Chicken, or Mr. Happy heard that song, it might not move you in the way it moves me. Might not move you at all.

Maybe my old buddy Holden Caulfield could sense what was a good song..
he could spot dishonesty a mile away. And, honesty is a critical factor in a good song... it has to have an internal honesty, and a believability. In order to do that, a songwriter sometimes has to reach inside him/herself while at the same time, stand outside. It's the songwriters that don't stand outside themselves who run into problems. They may end up writing about "universal" things like love, honesty, suffering and pain and write a song that no one wants to hear because they haven't put themselves, or a believable person at the heart of the song.

I have the suspicion that if we started a thread titled Universal Songs and asked everyone to put down songs they consider "Universal" there'd be agreement on a lot of songs, and some good laughs on others. Maybe I could start with Louie Louie.

Jerry