Songwriting tips?

[Bill Noon]

I attend a small group, we are obliged to produce a song or two, its not really my thing. I can empathise with most blues numbers, but the 'I love you baby' etc just isnt there.

When I do cobble something up, it tends to be 'Vuck the Man' kind of thing, think "Somethings happening here! or similar taste.

[Bob from Brooklyn]

Try to come up with a good title. When you can get your hands on one, horseracing forms will provide a few possibilities.

[SongwriterFan]

Originally Posted by Bill Noon

I attend a small group, we are obliged to produce a song or two, its not really my thing.

I know people who do this . . . they have to write a song a week or they are kicked out of the group.

I tried writing to a "prompt" once, and didn't like the results. Sure, I came up with a song, but it wasn't very good . . . and I don't want to intentionally write songs that I think aren't that good.

Some people think of it as "practice", and that practicing on a frequent basis makes them better writers. Perhaps it works (for them, anyway), but I'm not convinced it would really help me much.

Sometimes things just hit me out of the blue . . . I write them down . . and sometimes they are good enough that the setup line, and everything else, comes in a day, or a week, or something like that. Other times, it has taken me several months to figure out what the songs needs to be about before I write it.

And there are plenty of ideas that just sit in a Word document, waiting for me to figure out how to write the song . . . if ever.

[The Bard Rocks]

I am quoting myself from another recent post:

"As others have said, just do it. Pick something you know about so it will have an authentic feel. Then write, then rewrite.. and rewrite... and rewrite. Annie Proulx, one of my favorite authors, says that she often rewrites a book 50 times. Keep shortening it and get to the point where every word counts. Then if you are still unhappy, figure out why and don't be afraid to let one go if it's not good enough for you. I've written a number of what I call "throwaway" songs. Some are topical, some were "assignments" I gave myself (some of those turned out quite well).

In my case, I noodle around on the guitar until I have a melody that I like, then I fool with it for a long time, changing it here and there until I feel I have it where it ought to be. That is the time that I then commit it to paper. Next, I think about what kind of song it feels like. Sometimes that comes easy and at others, not at all. In those cases, I have myself an instrumental.

Once that is decided, the words usually come easy for me, but I have been known to scrap the words and start over with a new subject or maybe a completely new feel to it. Maybe play it faster, bouncier, slower, sad... different. And see where that takes you.

I must have composed hundreds of melodies by now, but not many more than a hundred survived to get put on paper and maybe there are only 60-70 with words. I never think of myself as a songwriter. "Traditional" is the word I prefer, but when I counted what I'd created, I decided my next CD had to be all my own stuff. Then I copyrighted my entire collection (as it was at the time). A few have been added since. I sometimes go a year without anything new. Then ideas start and I might do a couple a month. One of my last ones started with the words. That is extremely rare with me but common with others. And I quickly tacked a melody to it that, while original, was nothing to write home about. But it fit the subject and the subject was about a person whose complex feelings I felt I understood, and I ended up with a little twist at the end. I like songs and stories with twists, things you should have guessed would happen, but failed to do pick them out ahead of time. That does not happen often enough with me.

I should add that melody has always been more important to me than words. Not saying that is right, but it's me. Listening to something new, I mostly listen to the melody. When I think I have a good feel for it, I can go back and concentrate on the words. If it's catchy, the more I like it. Ditto if it evokes a real feeling or a mood. Melody can do all that. (So can words, of course.) When they two can combine, you will find winners."

[Chipotle]

Originally Posted by SongwriterFan

Some people think of it as "practice", and that practicing on a frequent basis makes them better writers. Perhaps it works (for them, anyway), but I'm not convinced it would really help me much.

Sometimes things just hit me out of the blue . . . I write them down . .

Good writers don't wait for inspiration to strike out of the blue. Inspiration takes hard work. Write down a bunch of stuff, everything, crappy or not, and you may end up with more usable bits than you think. And like anything else, it *does* get easier and better with practice.

Think like a photographer, who snaps dozens of pictures to get just a few good images, and maybe 1 in 100 is exceptional. But if they don't continually adjust, frame, move and keep snapping, and only take a few pics, they may not end up with anything good at all.

To Bill Noon's original post, I write very few "love you baby" songs. I write songs about friends who passed from addiction & cancer, songs about people who wrote their initials in wet cement, songs about terrible current events that happened one year, a song about a guy who got pulled over by the police and had a rattlesnake and radioactive uranium ore in his truck (that one came from a news story). I once heard a guy play a song about buying a snack at 7-11, and it worked! Song subjects are only limited by your imagination.

[Brent Hahn]

Originally Posted by Bill Noon

I attend a small group, we are obliged to produce a song or two, its not really my thing. I can empathise with most blues numbers, but the 'I love you baby' etc just isnt there.

When I do cobble something up, it tends to be 'Vuck the Man' kind of thing, think "Somethings happening here! or similar taste.

I'm feelin' ya. Seems to me that love songs are things people tend to write when they want to have something to perform but have nothing to actually say. And heck, people always like being told they're loved. But I'm just too much of a sociopath to do it just to have another four minutes of filler in the set.

One thing I try to be aware of is recognizing when someone is handing me a song on a platter. If you follow my "Originals" link below, you'll hear one where I ran into a friend on the street walking her huge high-maintenance dog and she just erupted into this verbal torrent about her horrible breakup and her new, traumatizing job. There's another one that I overheard pretty much verbatim, two blue collar workin' stiffs bs-ing in a bar. Two more very different songs of mine came from a conversation I had with a friend about how prayer can involve God, but pretty much any Higher Power will do. There's another song where, in the space of two weeks, two different friends of mine both had an addicted child's life suddenly and tragically end. They both said, "I feel so guilty saying this out loud, but..." And then they both said the exact same thing. The song that resulted isn't about that, but the thing they both said sure is.

Also, I'm in one of those phrase-from-a-hat writing groups, and for me it works. In this group, at least, the word or phrase doesn't have to be the subject of the song, it just has to be the thing that gets you off the blank page. In my Soundcloud batch there are maybe 5 or 6 songs that come from that group. With two of them, the phrase was "crickets and bullfrogs," but neither of my songs are actually about that.

Point of all this being... very little of it actually originates from within me, what I'm thinking or feeling. But I think most of it still works, without being all smoochy or eff-the-Man. Heck, I'm 68. I am the Man.

Good luck!

[jpmist]

Some of my favorite songs were written with the help of theft.

I usually watch tv with the closed captions on and you'd be surprised how much you can borrow from TV dialogue that will spark your imagination enough to come up with a "story" type song. So basically grab a few lines of dialogue here and there and see if that doesn't get the ball rolling for you. Once you have some lines with a good rhythm the melody and chords should follow.

Done the same with randomly flipping pages of a favorite book and scanning for interesting lines.

And I guess I should stress that the initial part of this should have zero self-censorship as possible. Be as open to inspiration as you can and just follow where the muse leads you and you'll get there eventually. Just get a few verses and a chorus down and add and polish later.

[Slothead56]

Melody and lyrics, lyrics and melody….which came first? Sometimes they Come Together (a song unto itself).

For me it often starts with a line based on an observation or thought. My Golden was down in the dumps one morning when I was leaving to catch a plane. I said “poor puppy, why so sad?” and it turned into a song that is often requested.

Other times a solid title comes to mind that evokes thoughts/feelings/beliefs and goes from there. The Magic Garage and Seven Square Miles started as titles based on ideas and started the process.

I’m not prolific because I’m lazy. To an earlier point, inspiration is hard work. But I also don’t write “throw away” songs. Any time I start to write I believe it’s going to be a masterpiece. Few come close which accounts for dozens and dozens and dozens of unfinished and unreconciled thoughts and scribbles. “Forgotten songs written on a napkin in a restaurant…seems I never finish anything I start.”

[KevWind]

Originally Posted by Bill Noon

I attend a small group, we are obliged to produce a song or two, its not really my thing. I can empathise with most blues numbers, but the 'I love you baby' etc just isnt there.

When I do cobble something up, it tends to be 'Vuck the Man' kind of thing, think "Somethings happening here! or similar taste.

No doubt not everyone wants to be song writer which is of course fine. That said, I am guessing that "cobble something up" is probably not going to feel very rewarding.

And then seems to me there is a substantial songwriting difference between the personal angst perspective of " screw the man" and the human condition and situational observation perspective reflected in " For What It's Worth" I am thinking they are founded in distinctly different life perspectives .??

So the song writing tip would be as a successful songwriter once said. "Better to Show rater than Tell' just a thought.....

[Horseflesh]

Originally Posted by SongwriterFan

I don't want to intentionally write songs that I think aren't that good.

This is how I feel. My guitar teacher (who is also a recording artist) is pushing me to work on songwriting... and I think I could probably put together some verses and I and IV chords... But it would be terrible, and I don't want to do something terrible.

I can think of better music that I would like to write down, but I am not yet a skilled enough musician to do so, which is frustrating. Once I can better play what I hear in my head, I think I will enjoy it a lot more.

[Gordon Currie]

Originally Posted by Horseflesh

... and I think I could probably put together some verses and I and IV chords... But it would be terrible, and I don't want to do something terrible.

This right here is the creativity killer. (Not to pick on this poster, we ALL have these thoughts at some point)

I encourage all to allow themselves to do something 'that might be terrible.'
You don't have to perform it, or even finish it - just give yourself a license to try something out that intrigues you.

You may surprise yourself doing something you thought you'd never ever do. Don't wait until you're 'good enough' to try. Life is short.

[Horseflesh]

Gordon, intellectually I know you are correct. I have to get past the emotional/motivational barrier.

[Mr. Jelly]

But it would be terrible, and I don't want to do something terrible.


All song writers write terrible songs. That's why they rewrite them and adjust and modify constantly. They are never set in stone. Rarely is a decent song a one-off writing session. Nobody starts out writing good songs. A person will never learn if they are not open to failure.


https://bigthink.com/thinking/creati...er-gatekeeper/

[jaymarsch]

Originally Posted by Chipotle

Good writers don't wait for inspiration to strike out of the blue. Inspiration takes hard work. Write down a bunch of stuff, everything, crappy or not, and you may end up with more usable bits than you think. And like anything else, it *does* get easier and better with practice.



Think like a photographer, who snaps dozens of pictures to get just a few good images, and maybe 1 in 100 is exceptional. But if they don't continually adjust, frame, move and keep snapping, and only take a few pics, they may not end up with anything good at all.



To Bill Noon's original post, I write very few "love you baby" songs. I write songs about friends who passed from addiction & cancer, songs about people who wrote their initials in wet cement, songs about terrible current events that happened one year, a song about a guy who got pulled over by the police and had a rattlesnake and radioactive uranium ore in his truck (that one came from a news story). I once heard a guy play a song about buying a snack at 7-11, and it worked! Song subjects are only limited by your imagination.

I fall into this camp that Chipotle describes here. I want to write good songs and the only way that I can get there is by writing a bunch of bad and mediocre ones. Sometimes the muse strikes like lightning but not very often. I was listening to Mary Gauthier talk about her songwriting process and she said that one of her songs took 4 years to complete. She was working on one line and just had to keep at it until she found the right words. But everyone is different and you have to find your own way with it.
Bringing in the inner critic early in the process absolutely kills creativity. If you let yourself write freely without judging you can get some rich material to fashion into a song. Then you can bring the editor in and shape it.
Best,
Jayne

[Stringmaster]

As I’m working on songwriting and getting ideas on paper, I noticed John Prine uses a similar strategy—and cruising through his “Beyond Words” book, there are copies of his “worksheets”. To me these are awesome to look at, and are adding inspiration and support to my process. You can see some examples if you Google the book and click on “images”, or better yet, just buy the book!