What people actually ask for
Funny requests between 4 September and 4 October came from too few people to count — one person alone made a large share of them — so instead of numbers, here is what the ones that work have in common. They are aimed at one person. A rap beat gives a punchline a place to land. And they are long, because a joke that works is a joke with specifics in it.
| What works | What it means for your brief |
|---|---|
| Name the person | Comedy here is personal. Name them, then give the two or three habits only their friends would recognise. |
| Rap for a takedown | Rap carries a punchline better than a ballad: the line lands on the beat. Say “funny rap, confident delivery” if the joke is a takedown. |
| Write more than you think | The short briefs are the ones that come back generic. |
| Give it a tempo | A tempo word (“upbeat”, “140 BPM”) is nearly free comedy: fast delivery makes a mediocre joke land better than slow delivery. |
| Keep the vocals | A wordless joke song rarely works — the joke is in the words. Leave Instrumental off unless the gag is the music itself. |
Write the punchline; don't order one
“Make it funny” is an instruction the engine cannot follow, because funny is not a sound — it is a specific sentence about a specific person. Every part of a comic song that works is something you can type.
- The absurd specific. Not “he's always late” but “he showed up to his own birthday an hour late, with someone else's cake”.
- The repeated line. The chorus is the joke's second telling, and the second telling is where people laugh. Give the chorus one short line you want repeated.
- The straight face. Ask for the style to be played straight — “a sincere power ballad about a printer that never works”. Comedy lives in the gap between the sound and the subject.
- The turn at the end. One line that changes the meaning: the affectionate confession after three verses of abuse. Write it yourself; it is the part the engine is worst at inventing.
Three shapes that work
A funny song usually takes one of three shapes, and they want different things from you.
| Shape | What makes it land | Type this |
|---|---|---|
| The roast | Affection wearing an insult's clothes: the target has to be able to play it out loud | “funny rap roast about my friend who reheats fish in the office microwave, confident delivery, upbeat, keep it affectionate” |
| The gag gift | A ridiculous subject treated with total musical seriousness | “a sincere 80s power ballad about the office printer that jams every Monday, big key change” |
| The inside joke | One phrase the group already finds funny, repeated until it becomes an anthem | “upbeat pop-punk where the chorus is just the phrase ‘not my problem’, gang vocals, 150 BPM” |
A roast is a form with rules: it works because everyone knows the affection underneath is real. Say so in the brief — “keep it affectionate, not cruel” — and the lyric comes back on the right side of the line.
Three and a half minutes is a long time to be funny
A described song here runs 3:15 at the median, and more than four in ten land between three and four minutes. That is far longer than any joke survives on its own, which is why the repeated chorus matters more here than in any other genre: it gives the song a reason to keep going. Write one line worth hearing five times, and let the verses carry the new material.
If you want it shorter, ask on Pro, where you can set a length — a 90-second version of the same brief can be funnier than the full one.
Why there is no example song on this page
The example songs on these pages come only from the anonymous, unclaimed pool, and only when nothing in the brief or the lyric names a person. Every funny song in that pool fails that test: they are roasts, and a roast without a name is not a roast. Publishing someone's friend by name, or their gaming handle, is not ours to do — so this page has the data and the craft, and your own first take will be the example.
Before you press Create
- The person, by name
- Two or three habits only people who know them would recognise
- The punchline written as a line, not requested as a mood
- One short phrase for the chorus, worth hearing five times
- A style played straight, and a tempo word
- “Affectionate, not cruel”, if it is a roast
Sources
Written and fact-checked by the Tunely team · Updated