Look behind you now and then

[zuzu]

Don't know why but this evening I opened my documents file and just started perusing songs titles of my songs. I found one I could recall, played it immediately, and was very impressed! It's very good but just never fit on any project I, or anyone else, had going.

Then I found one that I could only recall the title, the tune wouldn't come back to me from just playing the chord changes, I had lost the cadence ( I write melody first 99% of the time). I searched around and was in luck; there was a sound file. The tune is one of the best I've done, from 2008, but the arrangement was horrid, I sorted that right away and have a "new" tune to be proud of.

Songwriters, don't neglect work you have left behind, go back and freshen it up a bit, you may surprise yourself. But, if you are like me, you are not inclined to do so. My last band had 4 members all writers. We made 2 records, 11 songs each, and had enough new material, actually had track listed, two more records, 11 songs each...without bringing along any of the cuts that were left off the first two records. I go back now and listen, over two years later for some of it, and the leftovers are easily equal to the tunes track listed for the two records we never made. But, in our eyes at the time, they were "old".

Is it always the latest that is greatest for you? I am definitely that way but am very glad I happened into my documents file this evening. Maybe you should go take a look yourself...

[Bob from Brooklyn]

Funny. I went over some over some old recordings last night. I had a few 'when did I do that?' moments. Some of it was good, some of it was meh.

[Mr. Jelly]

EVERY song can benefit from being rewritten. That is a songwriting rule.

[Dave Hicks]

Recently I redid one that I wrote a couple of years ago. I put it in a different key, ditched a long, instrumental prechorus, and changed some words that were hard to spit out. (Played a more interesting solo, too.)

I hadn't played it out before, but have started doing so lately.

D.H.

[MarvinLee]

Lately, I've found that letting something "percolate" is becoming more and more of my process. Setting something down for a few hours or days seems to bring fresh inspiration to a piece. Only recently started going back to song demo's that were recorded sometimes years in the past. It's a hard notion for me to embrace, as I feel I should constantly be writing fresh new demos. That said, I am having a wonderful time re-cutting a song from 5 years back. At the end of the day, it is all about constantly finding fresh new angles. Took a while to realize this.

[Bob Womack]

"Check Six" , the short form of a military aviation term, "Check your Six O'Clock," meaning "look behind you."

Bob