SFP lyrics
SFP lyrics are going to be about what they seem to be about. You’ll learn about the singer very quickly, because they’re telling you exactly what’s going on. There’s no Si plumbing to send the S data to other functions, there’s no Fe sugarcoating, and there isn’t a high amount of N to extrapolate with. Instead, there’s a present focus in what the SFP sings about. Relative to the universe of topics, that might be artistically limiting, but a lot of us would pay good money to connect as instantly as the SFP can. And it’s not like the SFP lyricist feels limited; they’re writing exactly what they want to write.
SFP music
ESFP music will tend toward sounding full (because that’s more sensory data) and being direct. Why lead up to something amazing when you can start with something amazing? That leads to the happy side of ESFP music being good at parties because of the immediacy of vibe.
ISFPs don’t need to be quite that immediate; Se serving Fi will use Se more for keeping things real. But it’s not like you’re going to be confused by ISFP music either.
Some ESFP songs
(Note: as Se is my trickster, I’ve found that I just don’t have a lot of Se-dom music to begin with, but I also want to stay away from the notion that Se-dom lyrics are automatically shallow by not wanting to connect to something deeper. I don’t know if I’ve achieved that goal with the comparatively few Se lyrics I know, but that’s the intent.)
“Crispy Bacon” by Laurent Garnier (Music typing [it’s an instrumental])
This acid house classic gets into it from the first second – you get a two-note bassline and a beat, and by the end of the song you’re still on a two-note bassline and a beat. The beat develops to make it a reasonably busy and compelling song, but there’s just not that much to it. It certainly challenges my compositional priorities to hear one idea expressed this well for that long.
“Days Like This” by Shaun Escoffery (Lyric typing)
Trees singing through the birds
Singing songs that you’ve never heard
Belting in the sun as the smiling’s never done
Whoa, freedom reigns and washes away all my pain, my pain
Ah, it doesn’t seem like reality, but it’s here right in front of me
I love days like this, yeah – I love days like this, it’s here
Here comes the sun – I love the sun
I think this is a great example of Se-dom lyricism. We get almost no interpretation of the sensory data; it’s sung as-is. There are birds, and there is sun, and he’s all about days where there are birds and there is sun. It’s so direct that it can be relatable without any Fe. If you also love days like this, then you are like Shaun. Nothing cryptic, nothing for music magazines to scrutinize. Here he is, this is what he likes, and that’s that.
“Don’t Fight It, Feel It” by Primal Scream (Lyric and music typing)
Handily for this book, the main lyrics are about 2/3 Se and 1/3 Fi in that order. Also, this is one of my favorite tunes of the early ‘90s (and there’s fierce competition for that).
Gonna dance to the music all night long
Gettin’ high, gettin’ happy, gettin’ gone
Gonna dance to the music all night long
Gettin’ up, gettin’ down, gonna get it on
I’m gonna live the life I love
I’m gonna love the life I live
If the getting high is on life, this describes the ESFP ethos as far as I know it. That’s not very far, but hey…
“It Is What It Is” by Vintage Culture (feat. Elise LeGrow) (Lyric and music typing)
This choice was inspired by my niece (a likely ISFP) saying “it is what it is” a lot. From her, it seems to be an expression of Se a lot of the time – here is a situation, and it is a set of facts.
In this song, it’s applied to a past relationship, seemingly as advice to someone else in a similar position. A lot of the lyrics other than the title seem to be about the present reality not having a lot of meaning attached to it:
Just ’cause I window shop don’t mean I’m looking to buy
or the combination of living in the present and this advice coming from someone who’s a practical authority – an Se/Te combination:
You wanna take your time – don’t rush to settle down
You wanna see the world – you wanna shop around
‘Cause men’ll come and go – that you already know
Why listen though? Because I told you so
Pair this with an uncomplicated, rich-sounding instrumental track, and and you get a good example of Se sound and philosophy without it coming off as tawdry or ill-considered.
Some ISFP songs
“Found Out About You” by Gin Blossoms Lyric and music typing
There’s a goal of Fi expression in this tale of a failed high school relationship – the song exists to serve Fi – but the actual lyrics are mostly a recitation of what’s happened since it failed. Unusually, the emotional climax is entirely sensory data:
Streetlights blink on through the car window
I get the time too often on AM radio
Well, you know it’s all I think about
I write your name, drive past your house
Your boyfriend’s over, I watch your light go out
Whispers at the bus stop
Well, I’ve heard about nights out in the schoolyard
I found out about you
After all this Fi-Se, that ending chorus reads like his child Ni will be filing this relationship away as a pattern.
For a song I’ve known for most of my life – Gin Blossoms was my favorite band around age 9 thanks to “Until I Fall Away” – I didn’t expect to have this much typology to bring into it. After this analysis, the lyrics hit me as going about catharsis in a surprising manner.
“Free Running” by Other Echoes (Lyric typing)
Julian Huggins sings about free running in a way that you can’t tell where the Se and Fi separate – they coexist equally. There’s an actual physical description of free running (underscored by the music video if you look that up), but all of it is about individual freedom at the same time.
It’s got me leaping me tall buildings like I was on air and I’m free running
I’m crossing boundaries as if they weren’t there and I’m free running
And what lies beneath can’t hold no fear, ‘coz I’m free running
To make it anywhere, you got to take the first steps, so I’ll keep running
Free running on
To a place my heart and soul can call home
Where the past and future blend into one
Where the images of love and life lay
Where the dreams and demons come to play
We covered a much more conceptual type of running with the ENTJs and the Stereo MC’s song “Running.” This chorus brings Ni in – running to somewhere – but it’s not the main theme of the song. It seems we’re hearing from someone who gets a metaphorical Ni vision from literal free running and feeling freedom in doing it.
“What I Am” by Edie Brickell & New Bohemians (Lyric and music typing)
The sensitive singer/songwriter stereotype is that of an IxFP. It’s easy to extend that stereotype as favoring INFPs for the same reason smart people get slapped with T; it’s easier to imagine ISFPs outside not writing songs and INFPs holed up indoors with their guitar. But these lyrics wear Fi-Se prouder than anything else I know.
I’m not aware of too many things – I know what I know, if you know what I mean
And then we get a couple metaphors that would steer us toward a high N user, except they seem intentionally un-useful through making little sense and going unexplained:
Philosophy is the talk on the cereal box
Religion is a smile on a dog
That leads us to the primary thoughts of the lyrics:
Choke me in the shallow water before I get too deep
What I am is what I am – are you what you are, or what?
Taking these sentiments in the order presented, Edie Brickell appears to be singing that her two elementary metaphors are as deep as she’s going to get. She’s exactly who she is, and there are no depths to explore, and that’s okay.
A few contemporaries wrote Fi-Se “real talk” songs like this, only with full stories; “Fast Car” by Tracy Chapman and “Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?” by Paula Cole come to mind. Each has a bit of Ni in them as well, describing their lives, noting their feelings along the way, and wondering if this is all there will be.
Next part: ESTJ and ISTJ
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