It’s enormously tempting to suggest that the primary difference between musical theater lyrics and pop lyrics is standards, but that’s not really fair. If musical theater lyricists received the same level of profit and adulation as the aggressively talentless ilk of LMFAO and Will.i.am, that would be fair.

The surest way to ruin a pop song for yourself is to listen to the lyrics. Now, I know that this principle isn’t universally applicable, and that some pop lyricists are better than others, but even among many of the good pop lyricists, one particular trend repeatedly makes itself apparent.

In short, a disturbingly large number of pop songwriters tend to substitute assonance for rhyme. For example:

This is a rhyme—

Hand

Bland

This is not a rhyme—

Hand

Anne

This is a rhyme—

Land

Planned

This is not a rhyme—

Land

Plan

This is a rhyme—

Ape

Cape

This is not a rhyme—

Ape

Capes

All of the not-rhyme examples listed above are one breed or another of assonance, which is a matching of vowel sounds. What an assonance is not is a rhyme. Unfortunately, many pop songs seem to think that assonances are just as good as rhymes, which is a bit like saying that defecating next to the toilet is just as good as defecating in it.

The issue of rhyme is simply one of standards, like any other convention of style. You would no more produce a musical number without perfect rhymes than turn in an essay without at least running a spell-check.

And, true, not everyone uses correct spelling and grammar, but that is a character choice, not an effective excuse for lazy construction in a song that, in all other respects, is most likely groping for grace and profundity with all the eager desperation of a randy congressman.