My take on this subject is this. And this was my initial intention when first making the statement.
Song lyrics, and poetry are 2 completely different beasts altogether. I know people who write lyrics first then do the music, and that is fine, because usually the writer has some form of melody or riff or hook or something already in their minds eye (Including Bernie Taupin may I add, before anyone throws that hat in the ring) and therefore when putting music to the words they only require minor tweaking. Writing down a set of words which rhyme with no idea of melody however, is completely different, and each time I have heard finished songs where this has been the case, the song has sounded forced, like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. Songwriting isn't just about making words and music fit together into a legible and audible state, because anyone can do that. In fact I remember Elton John being handed a book on the Parkinson show and he sung the first paragraph to music and it sounded fine, and is a great party piece. However to make a good song there are other factors which come into play, such as delivery, feeling, flow, honesty etc etc....... 90% of the time I will write the music first and then the lyrics. The lyrics are never a conscious effort, they just come out of the music so to speak, and they write themselves in a matter of minutes. On the occasion that they don't I scrap the whole thing as I hate forcing a song. The other 10% of the time I will have a wee tune going round in my head and if I don't have an instrument handy I will maybe write a lyric down. This can work at times just as well as the other 90%. There has also been a number of occasions where I have written words down which rhyme (poetry) with no tune in my head. Each and every time I have tried to fit these to music it has never worked. It has always sounded forced, and I have therefore opted to keep them in their original form. Because I choose to do this isn't a creative failing as some have intimated previously, I just find it a more honest way of doing my work. I can put a melody to words as good as the next person, and have been known to be quite creative in doing so, so I can't agree that it depends on how creative you are. Because we can sing the menu doesn't mean the menu should be sung. That's not to say that if people want to sing the menu they shouldn't, each to their own after all. I just feel that good songs all have 1 thing in common, and that is feeling. Good songs move you in a way that nothing else can. I truly believe that from every piece of music I write comes the lyrics. They are in there already, and it's my job to coax them out through what I'm actually feeling in my heart at that particular time. They're actually a part of the music, rather than 2 separate entities. I hope this comes across in my finished work. If it doesn't then it's not a good song and I don't use it.
When someone is handed a set of words and asked to put music to it, they are being guided by the words and the content of the story inside. The melody process then is dependant on a syllable count more than anything, and being able to match these up to beats in a bar. When someone is handed a piece of music and asked to write lyrics to it, they are being guided by how the music makes them feel more than anything else, so it's a very different process, from which you get very different results. From one you get feeling, flow, truth and honesty. And from the other you get a square peg in a round hole all too often.
That's my opinion on it, but we all have different opinions and mine is only but one, and it's also not necessarily correct, just mine. There's no hard and fast rules in this game remember, and everyone has a different idea of a good song. But we're all trying to write our very own 'Imagine', or 'Blowing In the Wind', or 'You've Got A Friend' at the end of the day, and all of these great songs have 1 important thing in common, and that is they came from deep within the heart of the respective writers and were delivered with a passion and feeling that could only have come from the music which surrounded them.
My 2 bobs worth.
