I’m going to qualify a post that’s already too long with a lengthy caveat…I shared a draft of the post below with a songwriter friend who said the post wasn’t a good idea because music fans, in general, are utterly uninterested in the process or the “why” behind songwriters and their songwriting. I disagreed, but I may be wrong. Let me know what you think, as I try to keep things relevant for the audience here.
OK, why I write songs…
As part of an online songwriters forum I’m in, we were asked to introduce ourselves and type up a few words explaining why we write songs. Seems like a good and elemental question. I was surprised to find myself mentally hemming and hawing as I tried to put key to keyboard. It took a bit of mulling over to get beyond my initial simple response of “because I love music and I have a good time making it.” While accurate, as I thought about it, I realized there’s more to it, especially when it comes down to the angle of what keeps me going in spite of the occasional pie in the face, the day-to-day struggles, and the implosion of the record business. So here’s what I came up with:
Songwriting = Amusement. The primary reason—or at least where it starts—is entertainment. I’m generally obsessed with words and melody. They’re like two different cans of Play-Doh that are endlessly fascinating to mash together to make unexpected objects that take on a life of their own. As a youngster, well before I knew anything about music or recording, I wrote my first songs by beat boxing into a tape recorder, then playing it back and rapping over the beat box while a second tape recorder captured both “tracks.” I was just messing around and having a blast doing it.
Time, trial, and error have taught me this is an ideal place to come from when making music. Good things—the best things really—happen when I’m in this sandbox mentality versus when I sit down to “write a song” or, worse, when I start wondering what others will think or, worse yet, whether this song could be used in a scene where two improbably good looking homicide detectives get it on in a city morgue. Bad, bad, bad. That approach doesn’t work.
Songwriting as a Rush of Blood to the Soul. This is going to sound new-agey hocus-pocus, but periodically songwriting can feel to me like a window into universality, experienced as a quasi-spiritual phenomenon. I might be folding underwear in a laundromat on a Tuesday night when I begin to get a tantalizing and familiar feeling…like my brain has happened into a swelling musical current in the cosmos. I sense this and start paddling with it, i.e., I pull out a notebook or get ready to leave myself an a’ cappella voicemail. I ride the creative surge as it barrels over me and I frantically attempt to transcribe what I hear in those fleeting moments before I “lose the wave” (or the double-espresso wears off?). It’s a fairly common phenomenon that many songwriters relay. I heard that Bob Dylan once remarked about his music from the 60s “It wasn’t me who wrote those songs.” Whatever “it” is, this creative rush is an electrifying experience. There’s also a less heady but equally gratifying feeling when I don’t have gale-force creative winds filling my sails, but I’m able to chip at a song until it actually feels right and good. At this point, it’s my favorite song I’ve ever written, and I’m looking down from somewhere above cloud nine for a week.
Music = Connection. This is more than just a summer-of-love throwback to “it feels good to share.” This one feels a little conspicuous and perhaps not-cool to cop to, but it’s real and it’s there so I’ll toss it out there. In part, my music-making lives along the spectrum of the human need to feel a sense of belonging, of connection to others, and the feeling that I’m creating something of value in the world. It gets thorny. I think part of the challenge artists face—unless they are content to just play songs for their bedroom walls and a restless Lab-mix—is discovering their own process for marrying the sharing of themselves authentically with the creation of music that others connect to. The illusion of the siloed artist who sprang fully formed from the womb is a romantic notion that Hollywood sells convincingly, but it’s utter bullshit. So how do you balance undiluted and uncorrupted artistic vision with a willingness to listen and learn to what the music is saying, particularly when there’s a disconnect? The book “Art and Fear” says that most of our art will be crap and is only there to teach us how to make better art…art that connects. I subscribe to this outlook and approach. While I am personally entertained by and get fulfillment from creating music that expresses feelings and ideas that are important to me, I’m also a pretty social creature who wants his art to live in a social context. Art in a vacuum isn’t very fun.
Songwriting as Chiropractic for the Self. This last one is not so much a carrot that’s kept me going, but more of a benefit that I now realize I’ve gotten from songwriting. Part of being a songwriter is constantly discovering who you are and how you feel about things. Writing songs can be humbling or even embarrassing—reflecting back in naked detail on your mistakes, shortcomings, errors in judgment, or personal inconsistencies. These insights don’t always arrive as warm and fuzzy breakthrough moments. It’s often an alarming and awkward snap-crackle- and-pop that doesn’t leave you feeling immediately better, but hopefully these adjustments leads toward evolving into a better person.
There you have it. I didn’t mean to go Tolstoy and write a novel, but this little assignment sparked some thoughts I thought it worthwhile to flush out.
Take care, everyone.
Billy
A few weeks back, I had the honor of recording a webisode for the Harwood Podcast Network‘s “Live From Bay 6″ show. I was interviewed by Kevin Harris and played 3 songs with his house band of ace musicians. I was so impressed with the Harwood crew’s hospitality and professionalism. They rolled out the red carpet, making me feel welcome and at-ease from the moment I arrived. Lunch included a homemade soup with plump spinach leaves plucked that morning from Cindy Harris’ organic garden. Classy. My sincere thanks go out to Kevin, Cameron, and Cindy and the extended Live From Bay 6 family.
. Diane’s living room was filled with friends and friends of friends of ours who insisted we keep playing well after the 9:30 curfew we’d suggested, just to be considerate of the fact it was a school night. A big thank you to Diane and Will for organizing the House Concert and putting me up.
