I’m going to show my songwriting butt to the world in this blog. Here’s a song in the earliest stages of development. Earlier today I was going to work on one of my many unfinished songs, but couldn’t get motivated. I just wanted to play electric and loud. So I turned on an amp and grabbed my electric guitar, for some weird reason I started playing some rock-reggae music, Dm to Am. I immediately thought of some stream-of-consciousness free-writing I did about a month ago. So I dug it out, and started singing some of these lines to the music. Here’s the lines– no structure yet, no rhyme, etc. Just building blocks.
Too much traffic
Too much stress
Bright lights in my face
I can’t see / I can’t look away
I can’t pass
running off the road
When did this start?
How did this happen?
What went wrong?
I thought I was smart
Doesn’t make sense
Where’s the essence?
Where’s the root
Too many filters
It’s all fake
It’s all an illusion / delusion / mirage
lake in the desert
false attraction
noise and chatter
too many distractions
can’t hear the music
too much chatter
I follow the leader
not my brain
too many salesmen
grabbing my arms
reaching for my pocket
too much greed
lying is respectable
everyone does it.
In the past, I would have started trying to assemble these into a structure, with rhyme. But as a result of the mentoring sessions I did with John Common, I’m gonna try to stay in the creative mode longer, and just groove on a few of the lines with the guitar, experiment with melodies and rhythms and chords. I’m open to changing anything. Might not end up as reggae. Might be acoustic. Might not be Dm-Am. I might keep the music and throw out all the lines and write a completely different theme.
I’ll keep you posted.
P.S. – a lesson learned here: if it’s time for your scheduled songwriting time, and you’re feeling uncreative, lethargic and unmotivated, do it anyway. Do something. You never know what might happen. Put the time in.
-Rob
I appreciate your site! Thanks for posting your thoughts and ideas. We have a similar site (my friend and I) and we’ve been posting our song ideas and thoughts on the process and music-related news for a year now.
Here’s our link if you ever feel like checking it out. We’ve linked to this blog because we think anyone viewing our site will appreciate yours.
Peace,
Steve
http://www.songwritingapples.com