7 Quick Tips to Start Writing Conlang Lyrics ; My Method for Getting Words Down!

[@Wapcvm]

I should make a memerap using a conlang I make up where where every word is just the most utterly reprehensible piece of profanity

[@getoutofZEWEI]

This is a most assuredly a thing that is possible lol

[@thekingofcats27]

A conlang where every word is a slur in a different language?

[@renax72010]

I'm making a language where every word is just derived from a swear word in a real language

[@stephenweigel]

Looking forward to the inevitable xenharmonic Ithkuil rap society needs rn

[@getoutofZEWEI]

SO TRUEEE 👀

Idk why youtube decided to show me this but that's actually really interesting, I never even considered the idea of music written in fictional languages, it's also a greatly informative and to the point video, lots of respect for you, might listen to some of your stuff later. Cute owl!

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Thanks so much! I should note not all my music is in a fictional language ; I only have a couple that I've actually released publicly, which are linked in the end card if you ever feel like checking them out. ❤

[@kepe__]

wow, thought I was the only one with a problem this niche to find a video on it. good advice!!

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Thank you! Yeah I'm glad to hear, I was wondering if this would be too niche to find anyone else hehe

[@zagle1772]

wow is that jan Kepe from the best way to count?!?!?!?!?!?!??!?!

[@notoriouswhitemoth]

Poetry tends to follow slightly different grammar from prose, so this is a great exercise!

[@getoutofZEWEI]

For sure! Can be fun to mess around with what standards of prose your culture might use.

[@abandoned__]

i didnt know it was called conlang ?! and that you can USE IT IN MUSIC ?? i think youve just introduced me to my new 2 hyperfixations

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Ye! Conlang is an abbreviation for constructed languages. Alternatively you will see "clong" >v

[@abandoned__]

@@getoutofZEWEI i looked into this and MAN is it awesome !! thanks for this video hahaha ^^

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Of course!! Have fun hehe. Lmk if you have any questions!

[@cifge_404]

@@abandoned__ so how's it going lol

[@abandoned__]

@@cifge_404 its.. going ! its hard, as expected, but im finally getting somewhere !! i still dont fully understand what anything means but slowly... i will get there.. soon, i too will make music using my conlang !!

[@princecalcium]

Tip 1: Start with melodies and rythms! Me, who does the opposite: hehehe To be fair, that's how my creative process works when making songs in english. I'll probably do it differently in the future when my conlangs get more complex. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Lol yeah and that's totally valid! This vid is just the workflow I go through, generally. There's definitely times where I do the opposite too! Just depends on what the project calls for. UvU

[@cifge_404]

Dude. This is crazy awesome. Haven't ever gotten too far in making a language, but once I get one to a place where it's complete enough to write some stuff _in_ the conlang for the culture, I really wanna do that! including music! Twas encouraging to see this as I'm not that great at writing songs in English lol

[@getoutofZEWEI]

For sure, thanks so much!

[@krankerapfel]

I love Utau, I love conlang and I never think about mixing my two hobbies! Thank you!!!

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Of course! Mixing utau and conlangs sounds like a fun challenge hehe

[@kzeriar25]

my highschool project was making a folk EP in my conlang - it's called Valindhvart, if you wanna check it out, with songs like Vayakír hardest thing was word order and syllabe stress, which are semantically very important in my conlang. But the part of making up words to fit the lyrics is true haha The best part is that you can use wordplay and artistic expression you couldn't do in other languages - metaphors, contrasting formal/informal speech, but the saddest part is that you can write awesome lyrics but realistically no one's as interested at you in your language to search for the translation,and much less to understand these nuances.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

For sure, that stress can really effect the rhythm ; another thing I neglected to mention in this video tbh >v< I might remake it someday cause there's a lot I feel like I missed out on. But yeah I'm definitely wrestling with the fact that most of the nuances really won't get picked up by a majority of those listening. Providing some kind of gloss/explanation in a video definitely helps, but if you have a song up on spotify or other services, listeners may not see the video at all. I'm still trying to figure out how to best tackle this myself!

[@ente-cover2246]

making music with conlangs is such a cool idea man!!

[@getoutofZEWEI]

It is!! I feel like it's unfortunately rather rare to find >v

[@Mechanomics]

The Ar Tonelico games have done exactly that.

[@NotNochos]

This such a niche that im so happy to fit into

[@getoutofZEWEI]

glad to have you hehe 🤙

[@hydrashade1851]

ive been struck with the urge to write a choir song(maybe even a couple) with a conlang, so this video is perfect in the conlang regard

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Good luck and hope it goes well! ❤

[@honeycomblord9384]

My favorite artist to use conlangs in their music is probably Trhä. Definitely one of the best black metal acts of the past few years

[@alejandroparedes2500]

There's actually a band from 1969 called "Magma", the leader and drummer Christian Vander made the conlang called "Kobaian", it has such a deep lore and each album has something to do with it, and they even made a whole new subgenre called Zeuhl, which is a branch of Progressive Rock.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Oh hell yeah, thanks for sharing 🤙

[@MizhiBirb]

literally the exact video I wanted. I was looking for it yesterday but couldn't find anything

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Lol wow glad to hear!! ❤️

[@Evilratmancerwhocrawls2030]

I’ve been thinking of writing a song for my rp groups conlang, dog music is hard lol. Thanks for the video!

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Of course! And yeah things definitely get awkward when non-human species come along lol

[@purpleplays69420]

⁠@@getoutofZEWEI I usually tend to roleplay human-ish races for that reason, my conlang is spoken by a race of bipedal octopuses which humans call “mendako” (Japanese word for a species of octopus I forgot about) they however call themselves the “ashi” meaning “person/people” and most of their language was stolen human linguistics, so grammar, words, phonetics, phonotactics, sign language, etc. were mostly of human origin and they took it. It was because of a period known to them as “tsejun chosami” or “second chance millennium” which was a millennium of Humanity effectively rebuilding Mendako civilization to the best of their ability because the Mendakos suffered problems which we face today but pumped up to times 10. The period before humanity discovered and helped the Mendakos through their struggles to thrive again was called the period of hopelessness or “hovunami” (hopeless time). As humanity was rebuilding and making sure the Mendakos are back where their civilization was at its height so the Mendakos can develop on their own again, they stole lots of human words and grammar features that they found calming or interesting to hear. Mainly words about rebuilding, “to rebuild” literally means “ribiru”, “to hope” means “hoferu” (stolen from German “hoffnung”) and “civilization” means “bunsho” (from Japanese “文明” (bunmei”)). They also heard “is” and “は(wa)” so they combined it for “sa” then made another particle “za” to describe things. “sa” is for pronouns and people so if you say “we are” or “everyone is” you’re saying “vivo sa” or “tashi sa” and if you wanna say “school is boring” just say “gakepo za turevena”. They also stole thousands of human words about food, mainly from English so “lettuce” is “letasuko” and “apple” is “apako” and if you wanna say “I’m going to write a letter to someone” then you’d say “vi sa ashi ti leta tovaru”. If you thought they evolved like an amphibian, well no, in fact they evolved very similar to humans, their tentacles were for throwing things at fast and far distances, so to say they have guns in their weaponry, they don’t, they can chuck an asteroid from literal billions of km away and still hit something with good accuracy thanks to their enhanced eyesight as well.

[@Mechanomics]

Ar Tonelico is the ideal example to draw from.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

I'll have to look into it! Nier has a couple conlang songs too.

[@purpleplays69420]

Right now I’m using lyrics from existing songs and translating them into my conlang, I got a lot of new words and grammar points coined from like seven different songs, five being in English but the other two were Japanese songs. My current word count is about 500 and as for the grammar, I just made a few new particles which are like English prepositions and postpositions, most of my conlang is inspired by Japanese grammar and writing, so the usual syllables would go like CV(N) (Consonant, Vowel, and Optional Nasal). I’ve also made new verb conjugations from those songs (my conlang is heavily influenced by Japanese obviously)

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Going through the lyrics of music you like is definitely a fun way to find new words and grammar to figure out! 頑張ってね 🤙

[@purpleplays69420]

@@getoutofZEWEI my first song that I translated was bad apple by nomico, now I’m onto 歌に形はないけれど(Uta ni katachi wanai keredo) by Hanatan because the lyrics are very simple grammar wise so I wouldn’t have to struggle a whole bunch, it would mainly be used for gaining new vocabulary. I may sound like I just started my conlang again, yes I did, I reset it like 3 times and whenever I tried to make a vocab list, it’s fine until I reach hundreds of words then I start wasting more time finding a word I forgot about than trying to make the lyrics. So I tend to limit my vocab list to simple words like the usual five senses, simple greetings and phrases, and basic nouns which have suffixes for whatever they’re describing, “ko” for things, “po” for places, and “shi” for people. Edit: I got the artist wrong, it was Doriko, I first listened to a version of it by Hanatan but Hanatan isn’t the original creator of the song itself, Doriko is.)

[@EmyFelnen]

why is the "many many many things" part so true aaaa

[@getoutofZEWEI]

right? lol

[@CEPHRI]

YEAAAH!! extremely niche but this is the exact niche I've been looking for >:3

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Hell yeah! 🦉🤙✨

[@thehackking4419]

Haha! It's funny how i start making my conlangs from making music lyrics and base them from it. In total i made like 5 musics but 4 of them are not yet finished.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Ooohh interesting, I've not done it that way before!

[@Mochi.Rin_Official]

this is really cool, will definitely be sharing this with folks

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Thanks so much! I figure it's rather niche but maybe can get some people inspired to create more ❤

[@aepaesogun]

Fun fact: hÍoghvnc is the word for language in my fictional language. I was keeping my hÍoghvnc a private project (ghntsráenmo ictuiráen) for a while, until I standardized the form of the language.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Is there an IPA transcription? I really wanna know how to pronounce that lol

[@aepaesogun]

@@getoutofZEWEI It's pronounced "heye-oh-goon-ts" - It is explained in my latest video that covers the pronunciation, although there is no IPA transcription standard yet, it will be standardized in the future.

[@qondonyon]

also.. *clears throat* ... what if the conlang is TONAL?

[@quel2324]

This is actually a fascinating phenomenon that is studied with real life tonal languages! Some languages like Mandarin, which can often tell the meaning of a word from context if tones are butchered, usually ignore tones when singing, while others like Cantonese have very rigid structures in which the lyrics must adapt to tones to feel natural. And, obviously, everything in between.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Absolutely what quel said! That's a great point and something I neglected to mention in this vid. There's plenty of ways you can solve this problem! I'll add on, consider whether you have tone contours (irl example: Mandarin) compared to a non-contoured tone system (irl example: Yorùbá) ; that may better inform how best to deal with tones, if you even do at all! One of my tonal conlangs Lhálhan (which I regretfully don't use super often) (and also is NOT Láadan but the names are similar lol) uses a system of contours baked into their melody structure. As a result, it means the music of their culture has a very particular style that arose naturally ; something I can explore in another video for sure!

[@Permutative]

This is so helpful, I've been working on my music with synthesizing alien sounds for vocals and I'm kinda in a chicken-egg problem with the conlang and the music, although my struggles are different since I also have alien phones I have to manage in combination with these other aspects, these tips still apply

[@getoutofZEWEI]

I'm glad it was helpful for you!! And for sure, each individual project is gonna have a couple unique quirks to keep track of! There's a ton of stuff I left out in this video so as to not be too specific to a genre of music or a genre(??) of conlang ; experiment, mess around, have fun UvU

[@srhaad]

Love your music, keep going 👍

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Thanks so much!! ❤️

[@hollowknightenjoyer]

good idea

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Thank you! ❤️

[@hollowknightenjoyer]

@@getoutofZEWEI I hate you

[@ashtonisvibin561]

now this is the neiche ass shit i love to see FUCK YEAAAA KEEP UP THE WORK RAAAAAHHH

[@getoutofZEWEI]

THANKS I WILL

[@Matzu-Music]

Funnily enough I used this to write a song in russian

[@elielavoie8020]

Nice oc and nice vid !

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Thank you! ❤

[@ytbunnyrblx]

helloooooioo, a minute before this was uploaded i wondered if it would be uploaded soon, what a coincidence

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Hi! >v

[@ytbunnyrblx]

@@getoutofZEWEI:)

[@getoutofZEWEI]

@@ytbunnyrblx that's me! 🦉🤙✨

[@ytbunnyrblx]

@@getoutofZEWEIbtw i made like 2 ‘songs’ before with a text to speech bot and one of them is in spanish (the text to speech was really butchered because it was made for english😂)

[@livedandletdie]

Niche videos are the sole thing my recommended videos list consists of... Conlangs, worldbuilding, calligraphy, and random videos of people in some 3rd world country practicing a near lost artform.. yeah, but it makes my day brighter, seeing all the creativity people have.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Lol yeah for sure!! KZbin is really allowing for people to have a specific niche since the algorithm nowadays can get it in front of the right people who could be interested. I've got a pretty distinct mix of interests so I'm glad it can reach the right people >v

[@BenSwaf]

1:26 Уанеаан уааенг уеа

[@qondonyon]

waew :3

[@alejandroparedes2500]

Goat

[@vladspellbinder]

... I'm sorry, was there information in this video? I was lost in the thought of "cute bird" the whole time and wasn't paying attention. Jokes aside thanks for the video. It's an interesting topic and you covered things well.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

>v< Thank you hehehe 🦉🤙✨

[@vladspellbinder]

@@getoutofZEWEI Welcome! Your voice is a perfect match for the avatar and the movements are all just so perfect as well. Not too little to be not worth it and not too much to seem over done.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Aw thanks so much! ❤️ That's really sweet u///u

[@BenSwaf]

1:59 Дәсә әген Рхехене Кинуме Уиинйе Нрханазе Пәдәәмәне Секаезе

[@Indira-minuaga]

Ur cool 😎

[@getoutofZEWEI]

OvO

[@midloran]

This

[@JayFolipurba]

This is exactly what I tend to get lost in. "Create the word for father" - easy! Or is it? Do I literally make "father" or is it patriarch, or a metaphor like male parent, is there a difference between biological and chosen (either legally by adoption, or just in concept like a father-figure)? Does this culture have a concept of the core family or is a father basically any male of the tribe old enough to be your father? What's a male? And since languages are never isolated, I tend to make proto languages and think of etymology for each word. And only THEN comes grammar you see my problem..

[@getoutofZEWEI]

HEHE yep!! Same problem here for sure. Every word can be a rabbit hole cause language is just so rich with culture imo. I feel it can be a great way to show off the uniqueness of that culture, how they interact and understand their world! But as a side effect it turns in to an absolute time sink for sure LOL

[@lIlIIlIllIIIllIIllIlIllIllI]

YOUR FURSONA IS SO FUCKING CUTE OH MY GOD I AM SUBSCRIBING THE FUCK SUBBED THE LIL BEAK OMG

[@getoutofZEWEI]

LOL HELLO!!!!!!! hoot hoot

[@BenSwaf]

1:39 Цаврәмихқә цих хәнеи Пабадйә пәбрәх еҏә қаихне хеи мя нах

[@BenSwaf]

0:51 пәчам йиси тан пәну хеанә дәсә әген

[@TheRojo387]

Your feathersona is the LAST character I'd expect to be male.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

LOL

[@saxeladude]

um I dunno what conlangs are

[@saxeladude]

first 5 seconds and I'm already interested I have interest in so many of those things but I always struggled with finding software that doesn't fight with me tooth and nail to just create what I want cause I can't code, and am bad a research, and just overall just get frustrated and lost in the mess of debugging my cognition to just make one task work. I hate trial and error IT work. Though I think I have a pretty good grasp of game design. Anyway, I was asking for software suggestions please.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Assuming you mean software suggestions for conlangs and/or music based on the vid you commented on! Personally I do all my conlanging in google sheets, and then fonts made in Birdfont. My music is made in Cubase, and my vids are made in After Effects!

[@saxeladude]

@@getoutofZEWEI thank you! my comment was mostly about how all the hobbies you have interest in I do too, I found it very relatable. With the software stuff I was asking for suggestions to start out since every software I try ens up having a glaring and frustrating issue. for example I tried using 2d pencil to animate and it's the best free software I can find but it doesn't have the lasso tool and square selection is the only option. So all in all I just kind of meant suggestions for software in general that helped you or you think is helpful to learn the craft. Not just music and conlangs but art programming, video games, etc... I should have time stamped the comment to 0:05 cause it'sin regard to the text. I enjoyed the video but I guess my question was more personal cause I find you inspiring more than it was realated to the video topic. I suppose I mean I like your style and wanted to know any tips you have for asipiring creatives.

[@getoutofZEWEI]

@@saxeladude Ohhh I see! Well hmm I would definitely suggest free/cheap stuff at first to see if you'd even like doing that thing in the first place ; no use spending all that money when you don't enjoy doing it! If I'm thinking about getting a program or just trying something new, I definitely watch a couple tutorials first here on yt! I'd much rather understand the program before deciding to buy it (if it's paid). And from there if I'm still interested, I play around, familiarize myself with everything, and start making stuff! I was formally taught using adobe suite which is (very unfortunately) hella expensive. There's a whole ton of free alternatives out there that I'd suggest looking into! Personally I haven't used any of them myself though so I can't attest to any in particular. In regards to games, I have experience in a couple engines and would definitely recommend Unreal (which is also free!) ; I did work for Epic for a time, but was using Unreal long before then and would recommend it even if I never worked there! In terms of art, I have done it quite a bit but that's one of the things I had to accept as just not my thing. >v< I guess I just didn't enjoy the process! I'm much more comfortable with graphic designy stuff, so I work with an artist for all of the drawing nowadays hehe. I hope this was somehow helpful! I'm not quite sure if it will be. >v< But regardless, it's very humbling you find me inspiring in that way! ❤

[@saxeladude]

​ @getoutofZEWEI Thank you so much!!! This is super helpful it's nice to have a straight forward answer since research is one of my biggest weaknesses. I find experiences and wisdom much more helpful and rewarding to improve in general. I'm very grateful for the advice and hope I find some free software that works for me soon. and also good luck to you in your creative endeavors as well! I get that about the art thing. honestly the thing about art I've found is that it's never perfect. 100% of what's in the brain doesn't reach the paper. so at least for m,e when I try to draw I do so blind, as in I don't have expectations. I let the art flow and avoid erasing if I don't get what I hoped for I start with a fresh page and try until I stumble on it. though I've heard learning anatomy and geometric mathematics are a big help. with music I seem to find the same issue you struggle in art with of I love music, I personally have a lot of knowledge of music theory in particular. but using DAWs my prefered style of making music I find mind numbing often it feels like the process doesn't like me more than the other way around :c ; it's like I'm missing something vital and I share that experience with some creative endevors I have same is true for programming for example. once again I want to thank you for the advice. once I find something I'll post it here for anyone else who may have interest.

[@BenSwaf]

2:08 Рхеме Уанеаасә

[@zagle1772]

"this is not legal advic this is a youtube video about making music in a language that doesnt exist"

[@evaphan2720]

i wonder if someone made a song with uwu language

[@getoutofZEWEI]

LOL if anyone does pls send it to me I would love to hear it

[@FaithFueled_Official]

What app do you use to make music?

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Cubase is my workspace of choice! Not a super common one to find out in the wild but I enjoy it

[@filipemartinho1753]

Ive only done this once before, mostly to kill time in class, but I ended up using the conlang for my story. Very fun challenge. I personally decided to fuse english with the conlang, as in the culture, the conlang is falling out of use, and people who want to sing the song have simply resorted to using new english lyrics for the sections they could no longer understand

[@getoutofZEWEI]

Playing around with code switching like that is super fun! Definitely a lot of potential for some interesting stuff ❤️

[@ebicthings123]

bro wtf martlet doin