I’m pretty sure that coyote was very well thought out and written before recording. It has all the things that you mention. But you might not hear it on first listen. After all it was the “single” on the record. She’s not beating you over the head like a bubblegum tune. As Michael Franks once said of her: “When God gave out rhythm, he sure was good to you…”
It’s not that catchy. I can write stuff that I enjoy playing and enjoy listening to, but it’s no hit single. My point is just that it is easy enough to put some notes together and come up with something that is melodic and makes musical sense in a way that the Joni Mitchell song didn’t, that doesn’t make it a hit or anything, just tuneful. If I ever find myself coming up with something that is really catchy, chances are it’s already been written by someone else and I’m unintentionally plagiarising it.
Obviously not everyone can bang out a tune, but I think for anyone musically inclined, it’s not that difficult, certainly not the most difficult part of writing a song.
Edit: I think if you can improvise a musical solo, then you can write a melody and chorus. Just improvise for a bit, wait for something catchy to bubble out of the strings, snip the rubbish off each end of the catchy bit and fit some chords to it if necessary.
Seems we’ve proven that real, True Scotsman music is TV jingles. They’re among the most hummable tunes.
Demolition Man was right all along.
It is indeed a superb album and the title track is one of my favourite songs of all time.
I do wonder if it’s hummable however. Technically, yes : it’s neither spoken words nor random noises, but the melody is very restrained and doesn’t cover a wide range, except in a few places. There’s nothing particularly salient about it, nothing which jumps at you.
But it fits so perfectly with the haunting, hazy-dreamy imagery of the lyrics and the whole soundscape (those weird, low arpeggios) that it results in a gem of a song.
If the songwriter is only shooting for the “your love takes me to heaven above / in the night it’s gonna be alright” level of lyric writing, then yeah, no doubt. People will put up with an awful lot of crap in their lyrics if they like the music. I think Joni Mitchell was holding herself to a slightly higher standard.
The OP caused me to listen to ’ Coyote’ which I too had not heard before. For that I thank them. It’s a great song.
“H- E -Double NI- G- A- N spells Hennigans”
Diamanda Galas doesn’t count, right?
Yes indeed, christian stations get a perverse kick out of subjecting their listeners to tuneless monstrosities.
If so, I’ll nominate Screaming Jay Hawkins for Constipation Blues.
Yep, totally agree. I can write the music to a traditional “song” in a major or minor key in ten minutes. Pay attention to a few of the rules, and presto, it all works. Heck, I could probably write ten blues songs in 20 minutes. The song’s framework is already there, you just have to put in your rhythmic/stylistic flourishes.
Coming up with something that’s musical but innovates is the hard part, and usually requires a lot of work. You have to figure out how to break some of the aforementioned rules without driving people away.
I happen to love a lot of songs that fit the description complained about in the OP. Hummable or not, they get stuck in my head. So, here’s a few that popped in while reading this thread:
Sonic Youth: Brother James
King Missile (Dog Fly Religion): Take Stuff From Work
György Ligeti:Atmospheres
John Lee Hooker:Boogie Chillun (Only one chord for most of the song, and it’s anything but lazy.)
Well, yes. I don’t disagree and nothing I said would disagree with that. The point was not about Joni Mitchell, but a response to Richard Pearse.
I don’t disagree that banging out a three-chord song is not too difficult. Making it interesting and composing something musical that is worth listening to or is catchy is. For me, as a sometimes musician, it’s more difficult than the lyrical writing part. Then again, I tend to listen to music where I don’t even know what the lyrics are.
On the other end of the spectrum, we have singer-songwriter songs where the music is (IMHO) generally boring and predictable, but the lyrics hold the interest. In that case, no, you can’t get away with writing a lyrically generic song, since the interest of the song is almost entirely in the lyrics. (And, yes, we have people who do both well, too.)
Suzanne Vega, “Tom’s Diner” (sorry, can’t link right now)
That song is all melody, though. Absolutely hummable.
According to Billy Preston, “Will It Go Round In Circles,” ain’t got no melody. 
Not just hummable either. It’s hummed.