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by tobr·7y ago·view on hn ↗
This looks interesting in its simplicity. A few years ago I thought quite a lot about what a writing environment for lyrics might look like, so here are some free ideas to steal.

I’m on mobile right now where it doesn’t seem to work quite fully, so forgive me if this is how it already works on desktop - but I think it would be much more valuable if the rhyme search was automatically based on the words I write. Otherwise I will spend a lot of time copying/changing focus/pasting. It could even work like a code autocomplete feature, where it would suggest words or phrases that rhyme with nearby lines, in an overlay next to the cursor.

Another neat addition for crafting lyrics would be to add some way to analyze, visualize and/or constrain the rhythm/stress of the lyrics. It’s one of the main things you need to fit together when writing song lyrics. This could also help give more relevant suggestions for rhymes and synonyms that match a specific part of a rhythm.

1 comments
Thanks so much for the feedback.

On desktop, you can hit a hotkey (Alt/Ctrl + w) to send the nearest word directly to the dictionary to the right, which is a time-saver. However, I think there's also something to be said for some sort of autocomplete, especially if it can take into account the context, previous lines, etc. I'm hoping to do a similar thing with chord recommendations as well.

I completely agree that the rhythm and stress of lyrics would be valuable to analyze. It's going to be one of my major takeaways from today's feedback - I'll just have to figure out a nice clean way to include it!

Just showing a dot above every syllable, and highlighting stressed syllables could be a great start, as you would be able to see patterns visually.

Another idea that came back to me now: rhyming words are good, but if you can get phrases as well it could be a great source of inspiration. See Pentametron[1] for a good example of how evocative rhyming non sequiturs can be.

1: https://twitter.com/pentametron/