Songwriting Inspiration Information

awesome photo by this guy

First, forgive the unforgivable sin of blogging:  infrequent updates.

Here's some new content for ya:

Songwriting Sessions Hosted by John Mayer called "Inspiration Information".  
Sure, the video is sideways, but it's worth it anyway.  A friend at Facebook told me about this.

Part 1
 Part 2
 Part 3
 Part 4
 Part 5
 Part 6
 Part 7
 Part 8
 Part 9

 

And these REALLY COOL podcasts on the structure of song from Pandora.  Each podcast focuses on what makes each TYPE of music unique.  What are the elements that make country music SOUND country?  What are the song structures and chord progressions?  Very useful for a songwriter.

Podcasts on the structure of music.

And this super-duper awesome blog that interview several different songwriters and asks how they managed to write 50 songs in 90 days.

Songwright.co.uk

Neverending Armpits!

Bono has been quoted as having said "Imitation is the highest form of flattery." And if you check out these lines from his song "The Fly" from U2's Acthung Baby!, you'll see this theme continued:

"Every artist is a cannibal, every poet is a thief
All kill their inspiration and sing about their grief"

Continuing in that tradition is my five year old son.

Picture, if you will, a 5 year old singing in the shower.
Then, imagine, if you might, the melody for the song Neverending Story.

Here's the original song on youtube. It's pretty cheesy. Get that melody locked in your brain.

Then, add these words: "Neverending armpits...ah ah ah ah ah ahrmpits". Repeat about 50x.
Rinse. Repeat.

Sister says, "STOP SINGING!"
Brother replies, "I have to sing. Let me sing."
Sister says, "Ok."
Brother continues for at least two more minutes.

I'm SO proud right now I could just burst.
Moments later, sister joins in full voice.

Beautiful.
My son, the melody thief.
I'm sure he'll be a songwriting genius someday.

Advice from One of the Best

Tunesmith. net is a site I've mentioned in previous posts here. I've been doing quite a bit of reading over there of late and I'd like to share a few nuggets of wisdom that I've found with you. The first is a wonderful interview transcript with Chris Wallin, a successful Nashville songwriter who posts occasionally over on that forum. It's been a real treasure find to be able to read stuff posted in a songwriting forum by one of the best. Keep in mind that this information is from the "Nashville" perspective of songwriting. But, as far as I can tell, this is just solid information for any aspiring songwriter.

Transcript of NSAI's Pro Online Chat with Chris Wallin on June 7th, 2006

If time is tight, here are a few quotes from the interview:

Q: Do great ideas for you happen and "finish themselves" quick or not? How long does it take?
Chris: My writing never comes quick. I always have to build lines. When they do come faster then normal I always beat them to death to make sure I wasn't hasty.

Q: What is your single most important piece of advice?
Chris: In general, find out what it is that you do well and do that till you drop...no matter what it is. Whether it is editing, the idea person, melody, and so on and never write for the radio because radio is two years behind. If you can sing, save your $$ and do your own demos. But PLEASE be honest with yourself. If you can't do the song justice, get someone who can. It’s only your song that suffers if you don’t.

Q: Is it all about networking?
Chris: The networking helps but the best way to have good networking is to have great songs. The reason people will help you is because they like your songs. A plugger friend of mine has helped me out a lot. I thanked him one day for helping me. He said "Chris if you didn't write what I thought were great songs I couldn't afford to help you."

Ok. Now a few other quotes from Chris that I dug up in different threads on Tunesmith.

This one is his reaction to hearing When I Get Where I'm Going for the first time. I include this because I've had this exact same reaction to a couple of Chris' tunes.

This is one of those songs I heard and cried like a baby and then I called up Rivers Rutherford and said "YOU B*STERD!!!!" I have lost alot of family members in the last two years . This song hit me where I live. It also reminded me how powerful a song can be and inspired me to keep writing the songs that heal me.

This one is a small snippet from a longer post of his. This line really stood out to me and seemed to represent what we are about here at Songwriting Apples.

People look at Jeffrey Steele and Craig Wiseman and others and wonder "what do they do I don't do? I'll tell you.... they write 100-120 songs a year. They work their tails off all the time. They moved to Nashville years ago and sacrificed EVERYTHING to put themselves in the "right place at the right time".

I thought this "p.s." for one of his posts was very interesting...

p.s. There are songwriters here that will have deals one day . Probably not who you think. I wish all of you the best. Please don't stop learning. I learn something new everyday. If your dreams are flowers then hard work and knowledge are the sun and rain.

Concerning the process...

Sometimes I have Hook Sessions with people I write alot with. Just think of hooks and Ideas for songs all day and write them down. There will be alot of food at your next songwriting buffet.<---- ok so that was a little wierd. Anyway sometimes a song breaks out and you start writing. What a Concept.

And, finally, I don't think this is his, but he used it and it's relevant...

Just because you eat(listen to songs) doesnt mean you can cook(write).

Hope these quotes and the interview are useful and inspirational.

Write on,
J

The Skeleton of the Rocketship

Man, tonight was cool! First, I see an email from John N. Then I go to the blog and realize not only has he posted, but Liza has busted up a song in video format no less.

Well, I picked up my guitar and started strummin', and I had three ideas that I liked, but nothing concrete. I went to grab one of my infamous yellow notepads and decided to start at least trying to sketch some words down to get me something to sing from. I noticed on the first page a note to myself about something my son had said while visiting our family in San Diego. He was playing on a playground piece shaped like a rocket ship and he said, "Look, the skeleton of the rocket". I think I wrote it down two seconds after he said it because it sounded like such a cool idea. An album title? A song title? A concept album?

I was stoked!

Well tonight I used that as the basis for this song that came pretty quickly. It seems to happen best when I'm just noodling around and I have an hour or so to let things develop. I was sitting in the backyard and the kids were playing making mud in the backyard with the hose. I wrote a song. Here it is.

The Skeleton of the Rocketship
c2007 Steven Wesley Guiles

skeleton m1.mp3

verse 1
Your bones are cold but they're on a roll
How did we get so old, so soon?

First we were seventeen and we had almost seen
all there was to see, so we thought

chorus
The skeleton of the rocketship
The heartbeat of the moon
The hurricane reaches out to embrace those that it wounds

verse 2
I thought you'd never change; you lived through so much pain
Forecast was always rain, but then you melted

You're like a mighty tree, just look at all those rings
What will you do to me? I think that I won't mind

chorus
The skeleton of the rocketship
The heartbeat of the moon
The hurricane reaches out to embrace those that it wounds

bridge
oh what if I could see you?
see you like you are
O, that I could reach you
Reach you where you are

chorus 3
The skeleton of the rocketship
The heartbeat of the moon
The hurricane reaches out to embrace those that it wounds
The stars grow arms and reach out to us
They have seen all they need to see
The skeleton of the rocketship has flesh and blood like me

I've Half A Mind To Post A Post On Posting

Well, I went three steps further. I got an inspiration for a song, so I grabbed my digital video camera and recorded myself as I ran out to the studio and recorded the song. It's like a "How To" on how I write my songs.

It's not the ONLY way I write songs, but it happened to be the way I did it this time.

The video is heavily edited. I filmed 28 minutes of footage and am hoping to edit it down to five.

I will post the song here when I have finished the video and can post the YouTube link as well.

It's Alive!! Don't Give Up

So, one of those songs that wrote itself came to me the other day while my daughter was bouncing on a big ball in the studio next to me. I started by singing "Don't fall down". It evolved into "Don't give up" (I was thinking of a wonderful lady at work who has cancer and is currently going through treatment). The lyrics came out pretty much as they are, with a few half-time adjustments (the bridge and the chorus were written after).

when I started I really only had one long verse, which I really, really liked, even though it felt like cheating (because it seemed like something I'd stolen).

I revisited it a few days later and thought, What would John Natiw say?.
"Where's the chorus?" he might ask.
So I wrote a chorus.
"Is there a bridge?"
So I wrote a bridge.

This is a rough demo that I'm definitely going to develop into something more (production wise).

Don't Give Up.mp3

Here are the lyrics:

Don’t give up
Don’t give up
You might hit a wall but that’s to be expected
Don’t give up

Don’t run out
Don’t run out
You might have to face that monster in your closet
But don’t run out

Don’t forget
Don’t forget
Don’t forget that there are people who will help you
Please don’t forget (1 measure into chorus)

When you cannot find a friend
When you feel there’s no hope and
When you see no light at the end of the tunnel
End of the tunnel

I hope this finds you


Don’t let go
Don’t let go
You may find strength in unexpected places
Don’t let go

Give your heart
Give your heart
You might find out that you’ll get it back again if you
Give your heart (1 measure into chorus

When you cannot find a friend
When you feel there’s no hope and
When you see no light at the end of the tunnel
End of the tunnel
End of the tunnel

Bridge
Clouds will come, wind and rain
Sorrow and pain, yeah that’s for sure
Strong winds blow, that’s when you’ll know
That’s when you’ll know from where you’ve come

I hope this finds you
I hope this finds you
A hope that finds you
This hope that finds you
I hope it finds you

New Wilco Song

Here's another songwriter that I really, really dig, Jeff Tweedy.
Wilco is a great band and they have a new CD coming out.

Here's Jeff live with another song (not necessarily on the new album).


Here's a new song from that album. It has a little country twang to it (as did the whole last album).

I'll Take A Fifth and Thirty Useful Tips For $100, Alex

Here's a short explanation on the Circle of Fifths. Even if it STILL doesn't make sense when you're done reading it, you'll come away with at least two or three new chord progressions to stick in your quiver.

After reading that I started reading the blog I found it in. Great ideas here! This guy has a blog chock full o' ideas. I found myself just reading straight down the page and getting more and more inspiration.

He posted an article about playing live here.

That lead me to the site it was hosted on, Muse's Muse.

I feel like Alice In Wonderland here, but THAT lead me to THIS site, which was highly suspect because of the random pop-up ads, but I stayed and surfed anyways and found a list of programs for creating loops. (I've been messing with a pretty fun online loopmaking program called Splice that I really enjoy, but that's another rabbit hole to wander down at another date.)

Which naturally lead me to I Am The Mighty Jungulator, a band AND an educational software for looping music used in schools in the UK. Yeah. I took the blue pill.


Too many links? Sucker, you ain't seen nothin' yet. I need to write/finish a song now. As is obvious, the computer used its evil tentacles of coolness to wrap me up and suck me in.

(Read Jeff's Songwriting Blog if you do anything, but if you feel like chasing the rabbit, start with the first link and work your way down...)

iSOUND - A Wealth of Information for the Aspiring Performer

Normally when I find a really useful site, I just copy the URL and put it somewhere on the sidebar on this site assuming you all will eventually come across it. Tonight I was messing around in the Man-Cave™ and received a message from a fellow Michigan perfomer, Dan Vaillancourt. He turned me on to a site that had a page full of useful article links. A few article titles:

• Getting Better is All About Promotion! Promotion! Promotion!
• Entrepreneurship Is The Key To New Artist Success Today
• Image: It Still Matters More Than The Music
• Building An Effective E-Mail List and Delivering the Right Message
• The importance of blogging and keeping your content fresh

Check them out if you get the chance. Note the list of article links in the sidebar of this site. There is a ton of useful information available to the motivated artist.

John

Tunesmith - Songwriting Books

A couple years ago I purchased and read a book called Tunesmith by Jimmy Webb. After going back to this book recently, I can honestly say that every songwriter should read this book. Even if only for the first chapter. Webb is an inductee in The National Academy of Popular Music Songwriters Hall of Fame. His biography says the following:

Jimmy Webb has given the American songbook more hits, in more styles, than any other songwriter of his generation. The wunderkind of pop music, Webb became the hottest songwriter around when, starting at age twenty-one, he wrote a string of hits including "By the Time I Get to Phoenix," "Galveston," "Up, Up and Away," and "MacArthur Park."

Here are a couple quotes from the back cover of the book:

Tunesmith [is] an eminently readable master class in songwriting-one that will thrill aspiring composers and lyricists, yet still interest the general reader." - Michael Eck, Albany Times Union
Tunesmith may be the most interesting book ever written on songwriting... The sections on writing lyrics are riveting... It's for anyone who enjoys words." - David Hinckley, New York Daily News

Chapter titles:

Out of Thin Air
In This Room You'll Never Make a Mistake
It's Only Words
Elements of Form
It Can't Get No Verse...
Give Us a Tune Then, Jim
In Search of the Lost Chord
You and the Words and the Music
At Odds and Ends
Getting to First Base
Living With It

If anyone knows of any other useful books on Songwriting, please include the title and author(s) in a comment and I'll post the list in this thread or on the sidebar.

Thanks,
John

Songwriting/Recording Book Listing -

• Webb, Jimmy. Tunesmith. New York, NY: Hyperion, 1998
• Swedien, Bruce. Make Mine Music. Norway: MIA Musikk, 2003
• Blume, Jason. 6 Steps to Songwriting Success. New York, NY: Billboard Books, 2004
• Thall, Peter, M. What They'll Never Tell You About the Music Business. New York, NY: Watson-Guptill Publications, 2002

Songwriting Ideas: What's The Big Idea?

Photo by Quas

I was sitting in a teaching seminar and I found that even there I could find ideas for writing songs. We were looking at the big ideas that drive our lesson plans and I found a list of themes that I thought might spur on songwriting ideas.

Acceptance
Adaptation
Balance
Beauty
Change
Chaos
Choice
Communication
Community
Conflict
Connection
Courage
Cycles
Dignity
Civersity
Energy
Equality
Evil
Ethics
Excellence
Exploration
Family
Force
Form
Freedom
Friendship
Future
Geography
Happiness
Harmony
Honor
Identity
Individuality
Integrity
Journey
Law
Leadership
Liberty
Matter
Migration
Motivation

(there were more but I didn't have time to copy them all down).

Any more that you can think of?

That Water Came

That Water Came
words and music by John Natiw

Around the first of the year, I had been doing some bike rides through a local parkway here that had been flooded. The good news was that the parkway was closed, so I could ride on the roads. The parkway is designed to contain floodwaters and closes frequently during heavy rains. I'm always amazed at the power of water, and these four or five rides didn't change that. After pondering this for a few days, I figured there must be a song in there. I didn't want it to be a Katrina song, or about ANY particular flood for that matter. But it is a serious song.

The date of this recording is January 3rd and it was probably the second or third take I recorded. I listened back to it this morning after not hearing it for a few weeks and although this is an extremely early and rough representation of the song, was pleasantly surprised. I was intending on re-recording this one at a later date (and still will), but I thought it was worthy of posting.

This one has a bit of a "bluegrassy, sittin' on the front porch, thinkin' about stuff, story telling" feeling. There may eventually be a bridge added, but we'll see.

THAT WATER CAME.mp3 [01.25.07]

Mary had a baby last Sunday
She was just seventeen
Brought her home just three days later
times were lean

Friday night she sang to that baby
wind started to blow
storm was comin' along the old highway
the sky started to glow

that water came
like it knew her name

Mary dropped to her knees and said dear God
I'll do anything
If you spare me and my baby
I'll never ask again

I know there's been some things that I've done wrong
some that I regret
But if you could just help us to hold on
I'd be in your debt

but that water came
like it knew her name

that damn water came
(it came) just the same

they say the risin' water can't hear you
when it comes to call
no emotion or human feelings
it just takes it all

there wasn't anything anyone could do
in the rise and fall
two little angels died in that bayou
when the devil called

that water came
like it knew her name

that damn water came
(it came) just the same

black water came...

THAT WATER CAME.mp3 [01.25.07]

Quiet, Successful Careers

I just read the following in an interview with Glen Phillips in this month's Acoustic Guitar magazine:

Phillips decision to release Mr. Lemons on his own label came after several years of making demos and shopping them to major labels. "When getting signed becomes your job, you're no longer a musician," he says. "My job needs to be making music. That makes me happier than just about anything." Lauding relatively under-the-radar bands like Over the Rhine and the Decemberists for taking production into their own hands and not waiting around for the business to recognize them, Phillips says a rewarding life in music doesn't have to be based on "big hype and lots of dollars. It's about having quiet, successful careers."

Indeed.
J

How Do YOU Write Songs?

What process do I use when I write?

Well, usually I pick up an instrument and start jamming a little, finding a little chord progression I like, and at the same time I'll just be mumbling words or phrases of whatever I'm thinking about at the time. If I feel like I have a particularly cool progression I'll turn on my little hand-held cassette recorder (Radioshack) to get the original idea and/or melody and/or cool lines on tape. My memory is horrible and I have a lot of ideas, so recording them helps me focus the original inspiration AND just plain remember it a day later. How many times have I played something that I thought was really good only to forget it the next day? Too many. That's why I got the tape recorder. Cell phones also come in handy if you have a good idea. Just call yourself and leave the idea.

Songwriters on Songwriting is a great book about this process from some of the greatest songwriters of the century. (I saw used copies for $1.97 at this Amazon link!!)

This book was great because all of these amazing songwriters (Dylan, Petty, Paul Simon, Randy Newman, etc.) wrote in different ways. Some of them had a daily writing schedule while some only wrote when inspiration hit. It was encouraging to see that these masters of the craft struggle with inspiration, boredom, frustration, and "the wall" that makes you feel like you'll never write another song again.

Back to my process. I guess I get the original idea, and then I attempt to flesh it out by taking the pattern created by my initial inspiration and using that pattern to finish verse 2 and 3 and finishing a chorus. I usually can make up one verse that I'm really happy with and the start of a chorus. I then decide if the song needs a bridge or any other parts that would make it more interesting. If I don't really like it, why would I expect someone else too? I have to be happy and then if someone else likes it icing on the cake.

There. That's not the only way I write songs, but it is one of my approaches.

Looking For Ways To Start Your Song? A Few Ideas

This website was actually the flame that started the fire that got THIS blog going.

Here are a few articles that might help fan YOUR creative flame when you're facing the dreaded blank page.

Songwriting Tip: Constrained Songwriting

John Mayer Writes Songs And Talks About
Whether or not your a fan of John Mayer, he has some great ideas and advice about writing songs. And if you REALLY hate him, you can just read the article and then do exactly opposite. :)

Great Songs With Only Two Chords: Could You Do It?
Ok. Let's just take the word "great" out and there you have a songwriting challenge. Write a song using only two chords. Two of my personal favorites, the D and G would make a great song. No one said you had to play them in root position...

Song Critique Checklist
Check some things off yourself. Usually, we are our own best/worst critic. Give yourself a few guidelines and be constructive for a change.

Songwriting For Beginners Series
Good way to get started.

As I (or you) find more articles, add them in a link as a comment and then we'll edit this post to reflect it.