Musician’s Notebook

Sometimes, an article comes along that … well, it just begs reprinting. This is especially true of one that deals with the courage of a musician who’s terminally ill, yet is determined to continue his craft.
So, though it’s a bit lengthy, I hope you’ll read this whole post (reprinted from its source) and get some inspiration out of it:

EAST LANSING, Mich. /Music Industry Newswire/ — Ace Noface, a 38 year old man with Lou Gehrig’s disease, today announces the release of a piano rock CD, “Toxic Charm.” His goal is to leave a musical legacy behind, and raise awareness of ALS. May is ALS awareness month. Words like “inspiring” get used so casually that their meaning loses power. But in the case of Ace Noface, and his new album, Toxic Charm, one immediately becomes present to the true meaning of words like inspiration and courage.
The musician, living with a terminal illness, is facing his fate with courage and conviction by creating rich and resonant piano-based rock that is in turn hypnotic, jarring and spellbinding. Ace’s life and music is the ultimate example of living what is possible in the face of any circumstance.
Listening to Toxic Charm, you can hear the plaintive vocals, the resonance of the piano and the rolling presence of the rhythm section - it’s a huge sound for such few instruments, but it makes sense, given that Ace makes the most of what he’s got.
At one time the bassist for an indie-rock band, in 2005, Ace was diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, better known as ALS or Lou Gehrig’s disease, an incurable and degenerative neurological disorder. The diagnosis, obviously, was devastating. Ace remembers, “I really shut down for six months. I spent most of my days playing on the Internet and listening to music - I couldn’t deal.”
But a musician friend took a stand for Ace, and informed him what might be possible. “He told me that even though I couldn’t play an instrument anymore, I had to continue making music,” Ace recalls. “He said that he knew that was what I had to do to make some sense of the diagnosis and give meaning to the rest of my life, as opposed to just suffering. So I developed a sense of purpose for my life - probably more than any other time.”
To begin, Ace had to learn a whole new way of making music; using one finger, some computer software and email. It was a daunting task, but Ace quickly found a benefit. He explains, “When I’m writing music or lyrics I completely get lost in it - I forget that I have any kind of disability.”

The example of his work, his defiance in the face of a grim fate, and the songs on Toxic Charm that will be his legacy. Ace concludes, “When faced with a difficult situation, everyone has a choice to make - to let it define you as a person, or make the most of the time you have left. What I’m committed to leaving behind as a legacy is the truth I’ve learned: Anyone can achieve their dream, no matter what the circumstances.”

Songpoems are a dime-a-dozen these days … unless they were written by a legendary band like The Beatles — and have just been found after being missing for decades!
That’s what happened recently to some lyrics written 42 years ago by their lead guitarist George Harrison.

The words were penned on a scrap of paper when the musician was in his early twenties and handed to The Beatles’ biographer Hunter Davies, who had forgotten about them until now.
Mr Davies said the find was fascinating because it shows that Harrison was “secretly” writing before the point when he began making significant lyrical contributions to the band.

Apparently, the untitled poem by Harrison (who died in 2001 aged 58) was never set to music.

The lyrics were written in early 1967 – a time when The Beatles had stopped touring and were working on their famous album Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.

Commenting on the amazing find, Mr Davies said: “George gave this to me 40 odd years ago and, really, I forgot about it because it’s a scrap – it’s a love thing, about teenage angst.
This never became a song as far as we know and he never put music to it.
But now we see this, we know that secretly he was writing creatively from the very beginning but he didn’t show it to other people.
As he got older and The Beatles matured, he brought his songs forward.”

It’ll now take its place along with other Beatles memorabilia, including handwritten copies of the songs Help and Yesterday, penned by Lennon and Sir Paul respectively.

On the reverse side of the lyrics are instructions written by The Beatles’ manager, Brian Epstein, of how to reach his country house in Sussex.

“Although George is no longer around to tell us what the inspiration was for the song, I’m glad the lyric will be on display at the British Library for generations of Beatles fans to enjoy,” continued Davies.

Harrison’s eight-line poem reads:

I’m happy to say that its only a dream
when I come across people like you,
its only a dream and you make it obscene
with the things that you think and you do.
your so unaware of the pain that I bear
and jealous for what you cant do.
There’s times when I feel that you haven’t a hope
but I also know that isn’t true.

As always with the Beatles, they’re still fresh — although written All Those Years Ago …

Of all the classics coming from the vault we call “Rock-n-Roll”, ya can’t get any more genuine than Bob Dylan’s Like A Rolling Stone.
The song was crowned by (of all places) Rolling Stone magazine as being the #1 rock song in history. (ahem … were you asked to vote? Naaah … me neither)
But, hey — there’s good reason for the glory. Y’see, not only does the Freewheeler put a little bit of soul into the soundtrack to his first non-acoustic hit, but it includes the most ingenious wording of any folk-rock hit, before or after.
In the song itself, Dylan is addressing a young woman who, probably a “silver-spooner,” finally finds herself scrounging and street bound. It’s an exhibit in contrast, obviously meant to show the high muck-a-mucks that, in fact, it’s the everyday people — those who have to hang on to every dime, every crumb of bread, every drop of gas in order to survive — who makes them the so-called “superstars”.  The jet-set’s a drag, and, more often than not, just wants to use you. (OUCH!! That kinda sounds like a sermon for certain blonde TinselTown youngsters who can’t stay outta trouble! But it applies to anybody who follows suit, right?

My fave part of the lyrics? Remember the line, When you ain’t got nothin’, you got nothin’ to lose? That’s it. Been there, know the feeling. But everybody can take at least a few dozen lines of the song (and its equally-effective followup, Positively 4th Street), and apply the lessons they hold, right?

If ya can’t, you better go back and listen to it again with yer heart listenin’ …

It’s QUIZTIME, Rockers!: (Awww, you’ll find one of these little tidbits off-and on in these posts, so BOLO!  ‘Sides, it’s your chance to make a little noize!)
Okay … we all know that Bob Dylan idolized the late, great Woody Guthrie. But what mistake did Dylan make in trying to copy Guthrie’s style (hint: it really ticked off Guthrie’s wife!)? Send in your answer, and you’ll be introed here on-post if you’re right. Otherwise, gimme about a week, and I’ll give ya the answer myself, okay?

Well, that’s it from this side. Until next time, remember: Keep your eyes on the skies, your feet on the ground, your heart with the music …

and I’ll see ya on the flip side!

THE FORE: Mini Compilation Album is now available!

Thousands of rockin’ fans around the world have experienced the energy and excitement of this fantastic UK band! Now, it’s your turn!

But they know, like the rest of us, that the economy’s tight, and many folks have gotta watch what’s in their purses and wallets. So they’ve come up with an awesome offering to help ya fight high prices and dig the fab sounds of the band that’s turnin’ the rock music world upside-down!

You can get eight of their most popular songs, delivered right to your computer … and for only … ONE POUND! (about $1.50 US)

YOU’LL GET:

• ‘Man of Few Words’ (2006 version)
• ‘Little Louisa’
• ‘Love For Sale’
• ‘You’ll Be Mine‘ (all from the Album ‘Black and White‘. released in 2007)
• ‘Run and Hide’
• ‘We Were Meant To Be’
• ‘Lazy Day’
• ‘No Other Love’ (all from the album ‘Run and Hide’ released in 2008).

All for just one pound!! And it’s available on download only from the INDIESTORE at
http://indiestore. 7digital. com/thefore/ indieProductDeta il.aspx?pid= -114739

HERE’S A SAMPLE, ON VIDEO!
This is The Fore, doing their hit, Man of Few Words (2006)

So don’t miss out! Ya can’t get great music like this for less! Do it NOW …
and I’ll see ya on the flip side!

HEY!! (Just wanted to see if you were payin’ attention …)

Beginning this Monday, we’re gonna be runnin’ something a new and (IhopeIhopeIhope …) exciting here on Notebook:

Naturally, we’ll be goin’ over the business end for anyone who really wants to rock (or do Country-Western, or other genres), talk A&R, labels, and stuff that you cats can use.
But we’re not gonna drag here; if ya want totally serious, there are loads of news sites that’ll sourpuss ya to death! Yep, there’s a lot to cover here, but we don’t haveta be so serious in talkin’ about it, right? I mean, the readin’ oughtta be an enjoyable experience!

First, we’re gonna take a look at what really makes a successful rock band tick! You’re gonna get the 411 from one of the fastest-growin’ and most popular bands in the UK, The Fore — and a coupla vids to boot!But you’ll also be gettin’ upclose with gigs and venues from some of your favorite artists, old (yep … quite a few still around) and new!
Natch, you’ll be readin’ my chicken-scratchin’ here, too — I’ve been in the music biz for thirty-years-and-change, and got a lotta good, up-to-the-minute stuff to share with ya!

So stay tuned on Monday evenin’ for the first episode of the NEW Musician’s Notebook! ‘Til then …
I’ll see ya on the flip side!

During class the other day I found a technique to break any form of writers block when writing from a title. I will reveal the technique as I found it to be very useful to cure that disease we sometimes have of writers block. This technique is very similar to a word association game but it’s all within the title. What you have to do is get your title (which you should all know, should be placed in the chorus of course.) So I’m going to arrange this in a simple step form to make it completely easy for you.

1. Come up with a title.

2. Get each syllable of the title and make a list of words that rhyme with each syllable.

(NOTE: Be sure that you research the different kinds of rhymes like perfect rhymes and family rhymes. Also, refer to your online rhyme dictionary by doing a google search and getting a list of rhyming words a whole lot faster than your outdated rhyming textbook.)

3. Review each word under each syllable and be sure to plug them in the end of each line and using a proper rhyme scheme where you’re not being too cliche (or as most people like to say, “kindergarten rhymes”). Not only does it help you use clever rhyme schemes but it also exercises your sense of wording in a sentence.

You see it’s very simple! Just three steps and you can already magnify a song! Have fun with this you’ll often think that your title revolve entirely on just a limited set of ideas, but this technique I just showed you will completely destroy that. You can even try to do more than one version of the song and maybe even use all the versions and just change the title to something else. Enjoy my friends this is what we call a lyric template!

When you’re learning something about chords and want to get into songwriting, there are a few things you really need to know.

Let’s start off with the fact that you need a basic understanding about chords.

So what are chords?

Well, let’s just say chords are pretty much in a nutshell, 2 notes or more being played at the same time. Having said this we know that we have a large amounts of notes we can combine together and only some of them sound right together at the right time. Which is why I’m going to briefly get into chord colors. I’m not really going to go all into music theory about this, but I will give you a basic understanding about each chord color family which are major, minor, power, sevenths.

(For a free music theory crash course, go to http://www.musictheory.net )

Major: Happy and positive.

Minor: Sad, sinister, and negative.

Power: It’s got a neutral sound and makes it sound powerful, but it’s because it doesn’t use the third of the typical chords. (For example, Major chord have a 3rd (The second note) in the middle that gives the chord a characteristics of happy while minor gives it the opposite effect).

Seventh: These are supposed to sound kinda jazzy/bluesy sound and gives it a sexy sounding vibe.

Next thing to focus are the rhythmic elements of a groove. Those four basic elements are tempo, feel, rhythmic level, and rhythmic idea.

Tempo: Would be the timing on the metronome. In other words, when you clap your hands in rhythm to your favorite song. That’s the tempo.

Feel: Says it all, what kind of feel are you going for? Rock? R&Bish? etc.

Rhythmic Level: The main rhythm in notes. Let’s say for an example 8th Notes? Quarter Notes? Etc.

Rhythmic Idea: Would be like rhythmic level but combining the rests in there. So you’re not only going to be hitting 8th notes only, but you’re rhythmic level is mostly 8th notes, but then you have a quarter rest here or there.

Now time for practice, use a chord you want to use (any chord) and if you have a metronome put it in a tempo of your choice. Then just start playing a one chord groove. Try to use different approaches like use quarter notes, then 8th notes, and alternate. You’ll begin to get the hang of alternating your grooves without even realizing it, but the best thing way to use this to your effect in a song is by recognizing your motives. I learn this from Shane Adams At www.Berkleemusic.com

Exact Repeatition: Lets say in one measure on 4/4 you played a groove on the next measure you’ll play the same exact thing.

Varied Repeatition: The same as above except the second half of the second measure you will alternate a note or rhythm or so.

Alternating Two Motives: Let’s say you play a groove in one measure of 4/4, but in the second measure you will play something completely different than the first measure, but musically speaking needs to sound like its still part of each other.

Anyways, more on harmony next time…..

So last time we mentioned the fact that we have rhyme schemes and toggling last time. Well the reason why it’s so important to know the rhyme scheme and placement of our internal and external lines is because the structure of the song is very important. It has to be told in a story mode and in a style as if you were having a conversation with someone. Thats another great way to have your audience drawn to your music in terms of understanding the lyrics.

So here I’ll map out the information for you as how to structure your lyrics in your song.

So first thing’s first, we have the verses.

VERSES

On your verse you want to make sure you’re using the external lines to describe the character’s 5 senses and explain the place and time. You want to be kind of vague at first but not too abstract. You’ll have your verse describing the beginning of the story and end it with an internal line.

CHORUSES

Now you’re chorus is important in fact you’re hook is there to be repetitive with a strong power point. The power point a lot of times will determine the name of the song. It’s also the main idea of the song, the big picture. This is where you want to be completely to the point and you also want to use all internals! Make sure the last time you do your chorus in the song you repeat it twice. It’s also recommended that even though you have done a destination writing for your song, make sure you do a separate one thats all internal to make your chorus even stronger.

BRIDGES

Bridge is just another verse, but different slightly different. In a way it’s just another verse that’s not supposed to sound like the other verses. The point here is that you don’t want to bore your listeners by hearing the same verse after they heard it twice. If you think about it, the verse isn’t even the catchy part anyways, the chorus is, right? Right. So the bridge is supposed to traditionally be right after the second chorus. In a bridge you can finish your story here and just repeat the chorus twice after it, or you can do the chorus twice and just add a final verse and finish the song there. Just be cautious, you don’t want to bore your listener. In this case, experiment with both suggests I just gave you and also listen to your favorite songs and get an idea.

Now here’s the deal, there’s an easy way to do all this once you’ve got your DW done and you have at least one of your verses and your chorus.

What we do here is called Plotting.

PLOT PROGRESSION OUTLINE

Plotting is kinda like planning something briefly. Think of it as a short timeline you are constructing for like a history project or a book or something. Except the only way you can obtain this information is by getting it from your DW. So lets say you have your DW done, this would be how to make it headache free on how to plot it.

Verse 1

Introduction to the story. Describe 5 senses of the character of time and whereabouts and hint a little on the internal line. Don’t give too much information away because you want your listener to want more. Keep them slighty in suspense. Use 4-6 lines that you choose from your internal and external columns.

Chorus

The main idea of the song with the power point (the title) is there. All internal lines and the big picture of your story.

Verse 2

Get further into the story but don’t end it here. Get a later section from your DW and internal and external columns and in 4-6 lines and do it the same way you did toggling in verse one.

Chorus

The main idea of the song with the power point (the title) is there. All internal lines and the big picture of your story.

Bridge

You can conclude the story here if you want or you give an important part of the story here. If you choose to conclude the story here. Repeat the chorus twice after this to jam it into your listener’s head. If not, just give an important part of the story here as if it were about to conclude, repeat the chorus twice, and end it with the third verse.

Chorus

The main idea of the song with the power point (the title) is there. All internal lines and the big picture of your story. Repeat this last chorus twice.

Verse 3

Depending if you decided to end the story at the bridge will determine if this third chorus will even exist. If you didn’t end it at the bridge, you should end it here with the conclusion.

Here I will show you an example of a Plot Progression Outline I did for class.

“Stolen Car�?

Verse 1: The character describes getting into the car and his surroundings.

Chorus: The main point which is the fact that he needs to get away and he’s stating his desperation of having to leave.

Verse 2: The character describes the scene around him even further along with the frustration that the car won’t start. Why is unknown because its a brand new car and he continues to blame security of new cars and etc.

Chorus: The main point which is the fact that he needs to get away and hes stating his desperation of having to leave. (I would repeat this chorus twice)

Bridge: He describes his failure of trying to get away because the cop just caught him and so he explains his failures and once again the crowd reaction at the end.

There you have it! Give it a try experiment with different song forms and see what you can come up with the following information.

So last post we had done destination writing and external and internal columns. Now we’re going to get to the good stuff!

So once you have two columns of INTERNALS and EXTERNALS you will need to get some rhyme pairs from each columns. Maybe the first time you do this you might have a little trouble, but for now just try to limit yourself of the following options. A lot of times when we work of limited things it makes you’re pushing what you got to the limits. The shorter the destination writing the shorter the columns so thats why getting used to writing as much as you can on destination writing under 5 minutes is something you need to practice.

If you’re having troubles finding rhyme pairs you can do some of the following:

- Rearrange words from the sentences to rhyme with the next.
- Take out a thesaurus and use your generic adjectives into better rhyming words of the same meaning.
- You can probably mix two sentences together to rhyme with another two combined sentences. (I did this a lot)

Honestly, if you are so limited that you have like 6 sentences to work with, I understand write another destination writing. This time have in mind that you will want to do internal and external sentences but keep that pen moving.

So once you have rhyming sentences you now need to do some toggling and use a rhyme scheme.

Rhyme schemes come in a symbol for an example..

If you see a sentence 1 rhymes with sentence 2 but doesnt rhyme with sentence 3 or 4 but 3 and 4 rhyme together.. the symbol would look like this:

Sentence 1 A
Sentence 2 A
Sentence 3 B
Sentence 4 B

Extra note: Yes not all lyrics or even poems have to rhyme but the reason why rhyming is so great is because it helps the listener remember the lyrics, lyrics that rhyme and are remembered stay stuck in your head and songs that get stuck in your head are catchy and catchy songs in the songwriting market means commercial success and commercial success means $$$$$$$ and/or a great song. This is especially important to the chorus which needs to repeat a lot to be stuck in the listener’s head, because you want that listener singing that damn catchy song that is suck in your head even if they hate it. (Perfect Example: Jame’s Blunt’s “Your Beautiful�?…ugh! I know, but you can’t deny the song’s success.)

Now here’s the deal and I will say I am not Mr. Know-It-All, but I will tell you in this case there are different rhyme schemes and I don’t know them all but you can do a google search and you will find them. They come in many forms in 4-6 line verses, I’m sure you can figure it out.

Now let’s say we have rhyme pairs and rhyme schemes… what’s next? Toggling..

Toggling is when you get those lines and instead of putting them in an order of rhyme schemes you get a formation of the internal and external lines and toggling them.

Example:

Sentence 1 is External
Sentence 2 is External
Sentence 3 is External
Sentence 4 is Internal

Yes, it gets tricky when you’re limited to your short options and you need to fit the rhyme scheme and the toggle. In fact, I found this hard but with practice you will get it. It was actually advised by Andrea Stolpe that once you get more in depth with this you should do all this like every week and as you get faster do it everything and you’re songwriting skills will not just accelerate, but your songs will be more efficient so imagine writing like 7 songs a week thats 28 songs a month and multiple that by 12. You will have more chances of writing a major hit. It’s all a skill and every skill REQUIRES PRACTICE TO MASTER!!

Again there are also plenty of toggling formations as well which you can find online as well. If you have a hard time finding one, just send me a comment and I will make you a list of the most common togglings, I just want you guys to try and do the research because we can all share the great sites and some might be easier to learn than others. The best way to learn is multiple information from many sources because they are all explained differently.

You ask why do I want the last sentence to be an internal?

I will answer that next time but what I’m going to do is I’m going to post an example of one of my class assignments so you can get a good idea of how I did this, step by step. Remember, during destination writing, don’t worry about spelling just crank those words out because remember this isn’t an english class assignment. This is you digesting ideas and only you need to know what’s on there for your verse. Once you got the song written is when you make sure your actual verses and choruses are nicely polished.

“Bedroom�?

The walls are silent especially with the television off. Fan blows cold air into the direction of the futon bed. The same bed that smells like sex. The silver walls shine even through its old paint. The computer stands still on the desk on its own. I lay down on the futon bed the one in which you’re laying next to me. Bodies mended naked with each other. I am glowing inside as we begin to fall asleep. I am attached like a hook in the hole holding ourselves together. The redlight on the ceiling shines down on us like an artifical moonlight or a sun. Your tongue still slides down my neck and damn its been turning me on. Your so goddamn b eautiful with your blue black hanging down to the lips I love to kiss.

External
—————–
The walls are silent especially with the television off
Fan blows cold air into the direction of the futon bed
The same bed that smells like sex.
The silver walls shine even through its old pain
he computer stands still on the desk on its own.
Bodies mended naked with each other
The redlight on the ceiling shines down on us like an artifical moonlight or a sun.
Your tongue still slides down my neck
blue black hanging down to the lips

Internal
—————–
I am glowing inside as we begin to fall asleep
I am attached like a hook in the hole holding ourselves together.
The redlight on the ceiling shines down on us like an artifical moonlight or a sun
damn its been turning me on
Your so goddamn b eautiful
I love to kiss.

* So you saw here how I did some stream conscious writing just being able to pull out anything I can about the bedroom and what I can think about in setting a scene. Remember, you want to listener/reader to be put into this scene so paint a great picture, be a director to this AWESOME movie scene that draws them in the movie and makes them feel like your characters. You see what you do here is actually set a scene using external and internals and then you get those sentences in each these columns and this is what you get so far.

Now moving on, from the two columns and the DW (destination writing). We go and construct the verse.

The redlight on the ceiling shines down on us. E <-External X <—- (X means that this sentence will not rhyme with any of the sentences)
Like an artifical moonlight or amber sun. E <—- external A<— (WILL RHYME WITH LINE 4)
Your tongue still slides right now to my neck. E <—- external X <—- (X rhymes with nothing)
And damn its been turning me on. I <— internal A <—-(BAM!! Line 2 and 4 rhyme perfectly)

So the verse is …

“The redlight on the ceiling shines down on us.
Like an artifical moonlight or amber sun.
Your tongue still slides right now to my neck.
And damn its been turning me on.�?

Look over this for reference and start doing your own DWs and all the steps I mentioned so far!

Next Time, I will discuss how to use all this and apply it to song structure with this method to write some powerful songs.

So you’ve done your destination writing and thats great. I really hope you didn’t go a second over the time that the alarm rang. So now that you have all that done you will do some sorting.

So you’re going to read each sentence or half sentence and you will write down two columns.

Column One will be EXTERNAL!

Column Two will be INTERNAL!

In external you will write down the descriptions around you. The things you use your 5 senses with. External will be the picture to paint your surroundings. It’s also the best way to really describe and pull a listener/reader into the song. 

Example:

The smell of sewers filled my nose as if it were a grave of a thousand rat corpse.

That right there as far as descriptions make me feel as if we were there. It beats the whole basic description if we were to write:

The sewers smelled bad.

Which would be a generic detail! 

Sometimes externals help us describe internals a whole lot better. My teacher, Andrea Stolpe thought me the best example so I will use her example:

I felt hurt deep down inside.

VS.

I was crying laying on the floor, holding onto the phone, waiting for your call.

I know.. very dramatic, but which one do you think the listener would buy? What if you wanted to convince someone bout how you felt in a situation? Thats what you need in your songs!

Now internals do have a use. They can be descriptive in fact they can be very emotionally descriptive also without being external. 

For an example:

I was so nervous my stomach turned into a knot like the ropes around a tied victim.

I mean we wouldn’t really be able to see an emotion like this and all of a sudden a rope and a tied victim would materialize out of nowhere, right? No. It was all inside the person’s head.

So it can be tricky as to what internal and external can be sometimes, but the best way to do this is read the sentence and then think to yourself, 

For External

—————-

“If I WEREN’T a mind reader, what can I know about this character if I were there?” 

For Internal

—————–

“If I WERE a mind reader what can I know about this character deep down inside?”

So now we get these two columns of EXTERNAL sentences and INTERNAL sentences and I will explain next time on what to do on the next step.

By the way, while you’re at it, I didn’t mention my teacher Andrea Stolpe’s album is out and she also has a book released. Be sure to check out her site to obtain one of them or both of them. I learned a lot from her and I’m very sure you will too. Or just visit the site to learn more about her and see what kind of professionals are teaching at:

http://www.berkleemusic.com

http://www.andreastolpe.com

A lot of us, sit down with a blank piece of paper and use a whole lot more of brain power with the results of nothing coming out. What I have learned in Berklee Music is that destination writing was one of the greatest things I have ever to accelerate and improve your songwriting techniques.

Remember everyone this is music and this is not rules, but guidelines.

There’s a method to everything so these can be your way of writing or not, it might not work for everyone but what I can tell you is, if you have a hardtime writing lyrics 90% of the people I know that have done this had no problems writing lyrics.

So here’s the deal, I’m going to list a few steps on what you do to practice destination writing.

1) Think of a place (subway, bathroom, forest, bordello, etc)
2) Use your five senses (See, Hear, Touch, Taste, and Smell) to describe this place.
3) Put an alarm for 5 minutes from right before you begin writing.
4) Then just start writing and do what I mentioned in step 2 but also include how it makes you feel (or the character, if its not you).
5) In this writing process try to provide hints of a story which relates to steps 2 and 4.
6) Once, the alarm goes off, STOP! Seriously don’t cheat you’re only cheating yourself.

At first, you might find yourself with like a small amount of words and its hard to work off of it. Relax, it’s cool. It happened to all of us, in fact, when I first started I only had a 5 sentenced paragraph. As you begin to practice this daily you’re destination writing will be a lot longer and you will have more to work with.

On the next tip I will provide you with the next step after destination writing. For now, just keep doing destination writings.

Additional Tip: Another way to improve your writing is to get a notebook and pen and have it accessible to you when you wake up. Don’t waste another second and pick up the pen and just write whatever comes to mind. You’re sleepy and everything which means your subconsciousness is still awaken. You might have a brain fart at first but just make the pen move. Who cares if its one sentence or 30 sentences. Just write whatever is on your mind it doesn’t even need to make much sense. This is another way to get lyrical ideas. Many albums successful albums were inspired by the subconsciousness.

One great example is John Petrucci, the guitarist and main lyricist of Dream Theater wrote the lyrics based on a past life regression he had, which later became Metropolis Pt.1: The Miracle And The Sleeper and then later on The epic concept album Metropolis 2: Scenes From A Memory.

Other subconsciousness success stories can be found here in this article

Anyways, just continue with the destination writing and subconsciousness writing and you’ll be closer and closer to never facing an empty sheet of paper again.

I recently had a lengthy discussion with someone about converting original studio songs for acoustic sets, especially songs that are designed for rock and metal bands and those using lead lines on an electric guitar. The person I was talking with is particularly religious and plays in his church band, and he’s often quite disappointed with the way the wall-of-sound arrangements of the megachurches are converted for his church’s smaller band.

Bottom line is, they take the chords and strum ‘em.

Of course, as he said, this makes for a really boring sound and any interest the melodies of lead instruments provided is lost in translation.

What makes a great original-to-acoustic conversion?

Straight conversions don’t work, it’s as simple as that. If you boil a song down just to the chords that can be played on an acoustic guitar, the end result is a sound that could be the basis of hundreds of popular songs, seeing as there are only so many chords and chord combinations.

These “straight conversions” are boring, lifeless and unimaginative. They are clones of an original song, except everything that made it unique and interesting is stripped away. And from what I know, churches are the biggest offender of the dull “straight conversion” (of course).

The key is to remember that an acoustic song and a rock song, despite having the same basis, are by their nature completely different and that means striving to replicate a sound is not only impossible, but stupid.

You need to be creating a new sound. It’s got to sound similar to the original, but you have creative license and can stretch in new directions. Have you heard Korn’s Freak on a Leash plugged-in and then unplugged? On the weekend I visited my parents and showed my dad, also a musician and the man who got me started down this path, listened to the unplugged version first, and then the studio version. He said that he was actually disappointed when it came to the original song.

Why?

Because Korn did not set out to replicate Freak on a Leash like they did with a few other songs on that album (Twisted Transistor, Coming Undone, for the interested). They took old material and used it to explore fresh new ground, building up the excitement in a sound that still boggles my mind.

The Original Freak on a Leash Recording

The Unplugged Freak on a Leash Recording

You must adapt a song to the medium, and fully embrace what that medium means. When you play a song exactly as you wrote it for electric guitars on an acoustic guitar, it doesn’t sound like an acoustic song; it just sounds odd. When you’ve done a good conversion it should embrace and suit the acoustic genre and sound like it was always a part of it.

Don’t neglect the important of a good acoustic conversion, because once you have a solid repertoire, acoustic sets are a great way to get to know old songs more intimately.

There are five rock and metal musicians who I listen to on a regular basis when I need inspiration for my own music. I listen to these guys for recreation, but usually I spend hours at a time analyzing their music and what makes it really work. I want to understand how they created sounds, moods, and atmospheres, how they create a soundscape that just won’t leave your mind, or how they create intense, bursting build-ups to important parts of the song. I pick apart each song until I feel I have an understanding of how they made it such a great tune (attention to detail really counts here!). Here are the rock and metal artists that I listen to for these purposes - we’ll look at artists from other genres who I do this with another time.

1. Guns N’ Roses

These guys are the guys that introduced me to hard rock when I was 13 years old. I still remember the first time an older friend sat down and showed me their material; the first song I ever heard was Don’t Cry which just epitomizes fantastic evocation of emotion in music, and after that, Locomotive, which is such a diverse tune with fantastic vocal variance even if it’s not one of their most popular songs.

Appetite For Destruction is a masterpiece in my own opinion and if you can break this one down, you learn how to create unceasing energy in your songs. Of course, a big part of this is having that energy in you to begin with, but it’s so important for grabbing attention.

2. Alice in Chains

I hate it when rockers and metalheads make music devoid of melody for the sake of sounding hard. Even Dimmu Borgir manages to blend a huge amount of melody into their breakneck-pace songs. Alice in Chains were masters of heavy melody, and Layne Staley in particular had a voice that could make the heaviest of heavy songs melt away with vocal melodies that you could swear were stuck to the side of your head like a two year old playing with jello. Check out Junkhead and I Stay Away for some songs that will blow you away.

3. Korn

Korn don’t always have the best reputation in the metal community; they’re too “mainstream” for these cool kids. I love my metal, but I still have respect for Korn because despite their commercial success, their creative vision has still expanded in various directions. Their latest untitled effort is full of songs with such an experimental nature that I think some of the aforementioned boneheads are so mainstream they don’t realize it; pretty ironic for a community that prides itself on its counter-culturalism.

Korn wrap their songs in so many layers of sonic goodness it’s not funny. I have listened Hollow Life to hundreds of times and I’m still picking up layers that I was sure weren’t there before. If you listen to Freak on a Leash from their recent Unplugged album and analyze it, you’ll learn a lot about making an original studio song with a hard rock edge into an amazingly beautiful acoustic piece. Tip: it’s not about taking the chords and strumming them on an acoustic guitar.

4. Bon Jovi

I love this guy’s voice (if you hadn’t noticed by my obsession with the way a band’s singer sounds, I’m a singer myself). I mean, I really love it. When I first decided to sing after playing guitar, bass and keyboard for years, something I’d wanted to do since I began with music but never thought I could, I put Bon Jovi’s Crossroad (Best of) album on and sang the whole thing, every night, for a month. I still struggle with Always, but the challenge is a learning experience, right?

Bon Jovi, to me, is a great example of retaining your own sound while making music that is commercially viable. And as long as you don’t give up on your creative vision, there’s nothing wrong with commercially viable music; everyone has to eat, and despite what most people think, that includes musicians.

5. Black Sabbath

Black Sabbath sounds like cliched 70s metal today, but that’s because they sparked a new wave of music. They were the revolutionizers. To me, listening to this band is a way of reminding myself why I make music; not only because it’s my first love in life, but because I want my music to change people, to help them, to communicate a message. Black Sabbath communicated a lot of things, but the most important thing is: they sparked a new wave of music. They were an essential part of defining the type of music rockers and metalheads would listen to for generations. It makes it seem possible.

Not only that, Black Sabbath were masters of the hook. Even slow, haunting, minimalist songs like Black Sabbath itself stick in my mind for days after I hear them.

So there you have it; the five rock/metal bands that I listen to for inspiration on a nearly daily basis. By careful analysis of an artist’s tracks, you can figure out what works and what doesn’t. Now go and compare the studio version of Freak on a Leash with the Unplugged version, and come back and tell me what makes the acoustic version so much more powerful!

Tags: musicians, guns n roses, alice in chains, korn, bon jovi, black sabbath

It takes a talented and experienced musician to write hit-quality songs and coordinate a band and it’s repertoire, but everybody has to start learning somewhere. In the digital age, there are many ways to learn to make music with little to no skill and non-musicians can play with these tools either just for fun, or as one of the first steps to building a sense of rhythm and melody, and especially arrangement. Every Mac owner gets a copy of Garageband for free, and there are other similar programs like Ardour and Audacity that PC and Linux users can get there hands on for free as well. It’s a bit unusual to start learning music like this, but it makes it easier to pick up an instrument when you already have a sense of rhythm, melody and arrangement.

FYI: I believe there are serious problems in the music industry and popular music culture at this point in history and that our airwaves are overrun by people who just don’t know a damn thing about music. I am not condoning that with this article. This article is for those who wish to learn and cannot yet begin learning an instrument.

1. Melodyne

Melodyne is a helpful program for musicians and non-musicians alike. It’s billed as a tool that allows you to edit soundwaves with a piano roll interface. What this means for non-musicians is that if you have a melody in your head, you can sing it to Melodyne to determine which notes it uses. These melodies can be exported as MIDI files for manipulation as virtual instruments; so, if you have a bass line, flute melody or guitar riff in your head, record it vocally and fiddle with the MIDI in Garageband (or any other consumer level audio program) until it sounds like a melody for the instrument you have in mind.

2. Drum loops

Drums can be confusing for many people, including musicians who write songs who are not primarily drummers. So it’s doubly difficult for a non-musician to work them out with a drum machine such as Reason’s ReDrum. Thankfully, there are plenty of websites out there that offer free, and premium paid, drum loops. Check out ccMixter as your first stop.

3. A good rhyming dictionary

If you haven’t written a great deal of songs, nor have you had experience with poetry in the past, it might be difficult to grasp the mysterious, intertwined elements of rhythm and rhyme in the lyrics to your home-made music. A good rhyming dictionary such as Rhymezone will help you get started while you learn to think in terms of the sounds words make, as well as their various meanings and connotations.

4. A blog or frequently updated website

Whether you get some hosting with the affordable GoDaddy internet hosting company and install WordPress there, or use the free WordPress.com blog hosting service, you can release your new-found love for amateur masterpieces on a blog and have those tunes heard. Sure, they may not be the next chart hits, but what’s the point of a songwriting hobby if nobody ever hears the stuff?

5. A digital audio input

Once you’ve started getting into the hobby a bit more and have perhaps brought home a MIDI keyboard, a bass or a guitar, it’s worth purchasing one of the more affordable digital audio inputs so that your sound quality isn’t as terrible as the recordings you get from the computer’s default analogue inputs. Start out with something cheap like the FastTrack USB which can handle microphones, guitars and various other live instruments. If you’ve bought a MIDI-capable instrument such as a keyboard, you may have to pay a few more dollars to get something that does audio and MIDI.

With the above tools, I’ve seen a completely untrained non-musician make a song that didn’t sound half bad. You won’t be making masterpieces, but you’ll be having fun and getting a sense for songwriting and arrangement in the progress. Keep up some music lessons, either from a teacher or from books alone like I did, and given time those strange jingles of yours may just become the hit songs for the remainder of this century. Just remember when you’re using your voice to hit Melodyne with your next bass line: warm up first so you don’t screw it up before you begin!

Disclaimer: I do not have any financial or promotional connections with any of the services I have suggested above. I’m simply attaching to these suggestions the software and services that I use in my own songwriting and recording work with my band.

Building on yesterday’s post about themed collections, it’s important to choose strong themes that you know you believe in, that are broad enough to write several songs about, and that are powerful enough to stand the test of time and be interesting and important for listeners. You can do political albums, or albums that attack a particular set of world issues - environmental ones perhaps? Or if you prefer something a little lighter, and agree with me that love albums are overdone and overrated, how about something on the importance of family? There are so many angles to draw on using that theme that you could write several albums on it - family from the child’s point of view, the marital point of view, broken families, whole families, families under stress and tension, families being pushed to the edge of destruction thanks to the fading values of the society we live in…

Choose a powerful theme that you can believe in. Even if it seems a bit narrow at first, it’s not hard to take different angles and viewpoints on it to come up with more material. You can throw in a few songs with related but not quite on-topic themes too, just to keep things interesting and shaken up. The danger of this method of working is falling into repetitive habits, essentially re-writing the same song over and over again.

So long as you stay away from that habit, the effort is worth it for the end result.

Most musicians look at the individual song as a piece of art and the album as a means of distributing a collection of songs conveniently. But the album can be so much more than a means of mass distribution! It requires a small shift in viewpoint, but if you learn to see the album itself as a work of cohesive art, made up of songs that form a larger whole just like words form sentences, you can create something more powerful for the listener and fulfilling for you.

This is done by theming your albums and collections. If you start with songs, you end up with a mish-mash by the end, but if you determine the theme of your album and then work on songwriting and repertoire, you’ll have formed the basis for that cohesive themed work.

Begin by shifting viewpoint and seeing the album as the work of art, and then you can take the next step - determining the theme that’ll work best for you.

Morgan Cryar recently commented on this blog that while it’s important to have a good application base set up for digital songwriting, it’s also important to be able to capture ideas while on the move:

I seldom lose a song idea when I’m surrounded by computer, paper, etc. My biggest losses have been IN MY CAR!

The radio inspires, an idea grabs me by the throat, and there I am without my digital recorder. I have resorted to voicemail several times in that moment. But those little digital “one-button�? wonders are best for me.

And she’s right - it’s when you’re out and about, letting your mind wander and not really focusing on creative output, that your best ideas come to you, and unfortunately, when your best ideas slip through your fingers - if you’re not prepared.

1. Capturing Melodies - What I Use

Morgan mentioned a digital recorder, and she also mentioned using voicemail in times of desperation. My solution is somewhere in between; I use my phone, but not for the voicemail. If you have a smartphone or PDA, like my O2 XDA mini, you can usually hit a “Record Note” button on the side of the phone, allowing you to quickly and easily capture whatever auditory data you’re trying to retain. I have had at least a hundred melody ideas on my phone - if you’re like me, you’ll need a decent SD card for extra storage.

2. Capturing Melodies - Alternatives

Of course, going all out and buying a new phone is probably not the answer for most. For the best bang-for-back, you’ll want a device that can perform more than just the function of recording audio in the car. You’d probably want playback too. I can’t wait until the iPhone ships in Australia for this reason - at the moment I record melody ideas on my phone, but my main playback device is my (getting quite outdated) iPod, which I use to listen to music while commuting or to spend that time listening to and critically examining my own music. Having both functions integrated into one device would be superb.

While you’ll still have to carry around a separate phone, you can grab a device that records audio as well as plays audio just like an MP3 player - something like the Olympus WS-320M 1 GB Digital Voice Recorder and Music Player, perhaps.

3. Capturing Melodies - The Natural MacGyver’s Way

If you don’t want to spend a bunch of money on new equipment, there’s a cheaper way to do it. I had a friend who did this and it worked out well for him: set up Skype on both your phone and your home computer. If you’re around wireless networks all day, you can call your home Skype and leave a voicemail - one that gets saved as a digital audio file on your computer for ease of use. If you’re not around wireless networks, then you can get a SkypeIn number and do the same thing with a regular call.

4. Capturing Ideas & Lyrics - Automatic Backups

Most musicians find that capturing audio is the best way to hang on to good ideas, but there are times when it’s easier to get a written record of ideas or lyrics down. My favorite method is great because it not only gets your idea out of your head and into a fixed tangible expression, but keeps an automatic backup. In this age it’s not hard to find internet access wirelessly, and almost all laptops and many phones can pick it up; failing that, many smartphones and PDAs can send and receive email without a whole lot of expense. If you set up a mechanism to send email while you’re out and about, you’ve got a double back up of your work; in the sent box on your phone or laptop, and the inbox on the other end.

5. “Low Tech can save your creative neck”

That’s a quote from my friend NDK, whose favorite tool for capturing ideas is the good old notepad and pencil. Personally, I prefer pens, but whatever writing utensil you use isn’t the main point; having this low tech solution around can save you from losing a great idea, such as a lyric, and protect you from the terrible plagues of data loss, hardware failure, and malicious electronic device-seeking children. And if you can fill a few hundred of these, it’s a great bragging point!

Recently, Arjun Muralidharan of The Good Musician recommended a system of organization using a supply drawer so that musicians could ensure their songwriting materials were always handy. His system is a good one, but as I thought about the way I work with my band Midnight.Haulkerton, and when songwriting alone, I realized that over time I’ve become an almost exclusively digital writer, and a bit of an embodiment of “the paperless office” in practice.

1. Prepare a system of organization that is scalable

Organization is still important - if not more so - in the digital realms, so I have a folder system set up that keeps recording project files, lyrics, biographies and various promotional copy, images, tabs and notation all separate and highly organized. Over time, any creative person generates a mass of material so it’s vital that intellectual property be organized stringently from the outset.

For instance, my music folder is split like this:

• Music
  • Albums
    • Album 1, 2, etc
      • Lyrics
      • Recording Projects (Logic files, etc)
      • Notation
      • Promotional Material
        • Copy
        • Graphics
      • Marketing Plan
  • Various
    • Lyrics
    • Recording Projects
    • Notation
  • Music Marketing Campaign (General)

This structure accomplishes several things:

1. It keeps material from various albums separate. If there are many songs in your collection, this is invaluable.
2. It keeps “Various” unsorted songs in one place, out of the way of your albums.
3. It keeps lyrics, recording projects, and notation separate so that you can find each component more easily and as your collection expands, files are not permanently lost.
4. It keeps paramusical elements organized by project so you don’t use the wrong art for the wrong album or website.
5. It keeps the overarching master marketing campaign separate from the marketing campaigns from each album.

I have a friend with several thousand songs on his hard drive, but he hasn’t even implemented alphabetical folder organization - it’s impossible for him to locate anything he’s written unless he knows the exact title already.

2. Keep the best applications handy to capture ideas quickly

Of course, Arjun didn’t only discuss the method of organization, but the tools for the job. Ideas disappear as quickly as they come, so the best applications are needed to capture them. Here’s what I use:

• Pages or Word are great for writing lyrics.
• Keep a good tabbed browser such as Firefox handy so you can look for inspiration or use a good rhyming dictionary.
• Reason and Melodyne for capturing musical ideas quickly in notated/midi form.
• Logic Express to quickly arrange a song structure and have it ready to come back to for further writing and recording.
• Skype - I love collaboration, and many of my collaborators are in various places far from here. Skype solves this problem.
• iTunes, because sometimes that melodic idea is just out of reach and some musical inspiration from your favorites can help.

3. Keep logs of your communications

Like I said, I use Skype a great deal for international collaborations on lyrics and sometimes, melodies. While it’s a good idea to send copies of those collaborations by email after the session for backup (and, of course, as a courtesy) it’s also important to keep chat logs. You might want to go back for a line or verse you didn’t like at the time, or you might just lose the lyric in your Word document. Either way, logs of both your collaborative chats and emails are essential.

4. Don’t unwittingly relinquish your intellectual property rights

According to Tom’s Hardware, instant messaging programs like Windows Live Messenger and AIM stipulate that anything transmitted on their network becomes their intellectual property. This is why I specifically mentioned Skype above - you get to keep what you create! This is important, so let me repeat for you skimmers:

DO NOT USE ANYTHING BUT SKYPE TO COLLABORATE OR SHARE YOUR SONGS, EVER.

As a musician, there is nothing more valuable to you than your intellectual property. It may sound horrible to the idealist hobby musicians of the world, but the intellectual property rights to the song are more important than the song itself.

5. If you haven’t shown everybody, don’t show anybody.

Okay, so that may be a bit of an exaggeration. As a matter of principle, when working in the digital world, only share unreleased songs with your trusted collaborators or people who have signed a non-disclosure agreement with you. Preferably, those who are your trusted collaborators will have signed non-disclosures too. It takes two minutes to do this by email and protects you. Don’t make the mistake of trusting too much, because I promise you that it WILL bite you in the ass at some point or another. Get an NDA, no matter how much you trust the person you are dealing with.

Sounds draconian, huh? No - it’s just a standard industry practice for professional musicians. If you don’t do this, you’re crazy. If you don’t do this, you WILL get your intellectual property stolen, trampled on and will miss out on all the profits of your own work. Don’t wait until you have been screwed over to start protecting yourself. Every musician with a career does this, so if you want a career, you need to do it too.

These tips may save your career one day, from all kinds of catastrophes: good organization may prevent the loss of a hit song, and good protection stops some charlatan from running away with your song and making money off it for themselves. Commit them to memory, write them on your skull with a tattoo needle - just make sure you don’t lose your career to digital mishaps now that you’re working in a digital environment.

Throughout my life as a musician I’ve never much dedicated myself to learning music theory. It always seemed to me that I just needed to know enough to put together a melody or chord progression by noodling around on the guitar or keyboard, but along the way, like every musician, I’ve picked up tidbits here and there. Of course, there’s a very basic level of theory required in order to play anything. But after that is the point where it becomes enabling for the songwriter.

Learning some musical theory may be seem like a pain in the ass and a dry job, but it liberates you by expanding your capabilities as a songwriter. It may allow you to capture the melody in your head with your instrument, or even allow you to come up with melodies that never even entered the realm of your imagination. Either way, it’s worth at least going through some tutorials and making yourself a better composer.

Too many artists are playing stale music; cliched lyrics, cliched licks and riffs, and cliched outfits. Ok, so the outfits don’t make a band, but it’s a hard question some of us have to ask: does my music provide something new? Years ago, I played in a band with some friends that sounded like rip-offs from cheesy 80s hair metal, minus the hair (except one of the guitarists, who had one heck of a fluffball). Had I liked playing in the band a bit more, it would have been much harder to admit: we were playing stale, cliched crap.

It’s hard to ask, and it’s harder to answer, but it’s something you’ve got to do, and do honestly. Take a tough look at your music and if you feel compelled to defend something, then your question is answered. If it’s fresh and exciting material, there will be no doubt. You’ll know it, because you wouldn’t have heard it before.

Your first instinct will be to brush past the question with a “of course it’s not stale!” but avoiding the hard truth is the worst thing you can do. What have you got to lose if you ask? Nothing - you will gain when you start thinking about the kind of music you want to be making. And if you don’t ask? You’ll lose a lot more, such as the prospect of an audience.

So, are you providing something new? Is your music fresh, exciting, and a relief from the barrage of cloned marketing rubbish that hit the airwaves on a daily basis. Go on - ask yourself.

I once heard a great musician say that an artist’s finest works were those that brought even the creator to tears, and that they would live on forever in the hearts of those who experienced that art.

I guess it could be argued that a musician is truly making a clear expression of his state when he finds it difficult to listen to his own work, on the assumption that the piece isn’t particularly joyful. It can’t be to hard to listen to a frolicking staccato in C major, right?

Some measure this kind of success by the response of others, and look to see if their eyes mist up, but in my experience it truly is the creator’s tears that matter. Why? Simply because it’s a lot easier to invoke such an emotional reaction in others than in oneself.

I was falling into a bit of a songwriting rut from a compositional point of view over the last two weeks and tried all my usual tricks to free myself from it. But this time, it wasn’t that there was no melodies building up inside; I had been so caught up in the structured process of songwriting and working to expand the band’s repertoire and improve on the existing material, that I’d forgotten the creatively liberating power of unstructured jamming.

Then the other night, at a friend’s house with a bunch of musicians in the living room, the curse broke. Why? Simply put: a few beers and six hours of jamming for fun, for no reason and with no goals in mind, with a few like-minded musicians and a bunch of acoustic instruments.

Better still, none of these musicians were members of my band. My band is made of fantastic musicians, but working incessantly with the same people - no matter how skilled - can turn off some creative lights

After six hours, I felt free again, and the musical ideas have been pouring out just as fast the lyrical ones.

As readers will know, my band Midnight.Haulkerton does a weekly Tuneback, a song that is written, recorded and published online all in one hour or less. Since most songs go through the same process over days, weeks or even months (and in a few cases, years, like one of our songs Pages which was written years ago and continues to evolve) to achieve refined quality, the quality of the Tuneback process can really vary.

Compare Creative Commons for the Common Man and Reality. Sometimes it works, and other times it doesn’t work out so well. Creative Commons for the Common Man was something that we felt had the basics of any good and polished song, while Reality came from not having a whole lot of inspiration or motivation during the specific time and day of week when we do this.

It’s interesting to note that while I’m a proponent of uncompromising quality in works of art and entertainment, I still strongly advocate the Tuneback and what it can do for both the band and listeners. For the band, it’s a skill strengthening exercise, and for the listeners, there’s new material, week after week. But why publish substandard material if one advocates what any artist should, that character of uncompromising quality?

We know, and our listeners know, that a Tuneback isn’t a polished, commercial product; it’s the rough and raw output of our creative energy. It’s like a sketch compared to a painting; they don’t compare at all–but one can still find beauty in a sketch.

In fact, one can sometimes find more beauty in a sketch, than in a painting. While refining and polishing a song is usually a good thing, it can also take away the edge of the song, that rawness that excites and ignites listeners.

I still believe we should incessantly seek uncompromising quality, but we also need to recognize artistic beauty in its various forms, and appreciate that different musical formats deliver different purposes and expectations. A song from an album or a single faces the public expectation of polish and a certain healthy dose of commercialization; the Tuneback, on the other hand, demands the opposite, an unrefined snapshot of an idea.

Writing a song that requires that dissonant, haunting feel? Best popularized by songs such as Black Sabbath’s Black Sabbath, the intro to Jimi Hendrix’s Purple Haze and even the Dilbert TV show’s theme song, this interval is often condemned to stay forever in the genre of metal.

With a little experimentation, though, it can be used to create a haunting sound in any genre. Of course, classical musicians were using the interval in their compositions hundreds of years before metal’s arrival, and it can be applied to any song that calls for it.

The tritone is a musical interval that spans three whole tones and is also known as the augmented fourth or diminished fifth. For instance, the augmented fourth between C and F# forms a tritone.

Now I know you rockers probably don’t care about the theoretical implications (to be honest, neither do I, but don’t tell that to the people who hired me!) so I’ll give you the rough and dirty guitar tab that demonstrates the interval:

A—2–1–
E-0——-

And an example from Black Sabbath’s Black Sabbath to put it into context:

G——————
D–0—5———–
A———–4——-
E–3—————-

Now get that tritone to use in your own songs about haunted houses!

When you’re writing a song, do you consider who you are writing for?

There are two ‘communication models’ in songwriting that are determined by the receptors of your communication:

Broad communication - you write your songs with a broad audience in mind, typically broaching important issues. You use songwriting skills to make these issues emotive and relevant to the listener, perhaps to affect a change in their opinion.

Narrow communication - this occurs when you write with a specific audience in your mind, generally something like a friend, love interest, family member, neighbour - you get the point. Usually, these songs are of a personal nature. Love songs fall under this category.

Though I prefer broad communication in my songs, tackling issues of importance and bringing a relevant, emotional touch to sometimes all-to-dry subjects, both have their place. It’s still important to consider who you’re communicating to, and which model of songwriting you’re using, to craft the most effective piece. Songwriting is essentially a form of communication (all art is - art comes from the Latin ars, or to communicate) and thus, to make it effective, a certain amount of planning is required.

How much planning? Essentially you have to be aware of your audience and your message.

Writing with your audience in mind allows you to write a communication that they can understand. Mind you, this is not selling out. This does not dictate what you write about, but merely guides you as to how you should structure it. It’s called professional songwriting, and if you want to whine about it, stick to hobby writing ;)

Writing with your message in mind is a no-brainer. You need to stay on-topic. You can’t cram a million different things with no structure into the one piece, not if you intend to craft a powerful, listenable, understandable song. But if you know your message, and know why you are writing and why it is important, you’ve got it covered.

Consider these concepts and how you can use them to write stronger songs, and you might surprise yourself next time you pick up the pen.