Songwriting 101

Scott Wilson

by Scott Wilson

I’ve been asked to write something about how I come up with songs. I’ve been hesitant to write about this subject because it tends to be a mysterious process for me, but I’ve decided to give it a shot and see what happens.

There are a number of different routes to finishing a song or even starting one. Usually when people ask about songwriting, they ask, “what comes first, the music or the lyrics (or melody)?” In general, when I’ve decided to sit down and write a song, I pick up the guitar and try to find some sort of interesting and possibly unique chord sequence to begin with. The important part of this is the beginning of the statement, because sometimes I don’t decide to write a song. I have had dreams of songs and I woke up to write them down when I woke up. I have had songs come to me from beginning to end, and I’ve run down the street to get to a pen and paper. I’ve come up with words and melodies and sang them to a co-writer who has written music to the melody. I’ve been inspired by other artists and songwriters to write songs that answers or responds to their songs or ideas. I’ve even taken bits and pieces of other songs that I’ve written and merged them into a more complete version. Ultimately there are a multitude of ways to get to the same goal, and I find that being flexible about technique is the best way to get a song that is worth recording and finishing.

Often songwriting for me is some sort of psychic purging. I’m thinking of some issue that I’m turning around in my mind, or a general concept, and that will bring to mind a theme that I will put in a (hopefully) creative way, inspiring me to fill in the blanks with verses and choruses and bridges that flesh it out, and possibly provide unintended aspects and insights into the issue that I would not have ordinarily considered. Sometimes this occurs on a subconscious level, where I write a song and it’s not until many years later that I get a full understanding of what I have written. I have performed songs in situations that revealed new aspects of the songs that I never intended at the moment of completion.

So these are some of the mysterious circumstances that bring ideas to life. There are some that believe that there are aspects of the divine in the creative act, and that our commitment to the art of music is our commitment to the source of our inspiration. It is very strange that people persist in their efforts to perform and disseminate their music despite so much resistance and opposition. I was reading an article about some of the great unreleased albums of all time, and was struck by the fact that some people have literally gone off the deep end trying to finish an album. There are usually other factors including drugs that enter the equation, but it is fascinating that people would be so committed to the creative process that they would ultimately damage themselves in the process of trying to realize their creative impulses. People have died penniless and insane as the result of following their creative urges, and yet there is an unending line of people that take this real risk everyday in order to climb up on a stage and sing a song. It’s really quite a miracle when you stop to consider it.

So, when I decide to write a song, I pick up the guitar. I pull out my notebook, get a pen ready, and start to strum. And usually something starts to form. Where it comes from I don’t know. The psyche ultimately is a great mystery. Usually I write down a lot more than I generally use. I usually have two stages to the process – the initial creative phase, and then the editorial phase, where I start to shape the ideas into a more coherent form. I have written with people that killed any creative impulse they have by trying to combine these two phases, and it has been my experience that these are probably the responses of the different hemispheres of the brain, and how they relate to the creative process. The right brain, it would seem, is more involved in the initial creative impulse, and the left brain would be more involved in the organizing principles. I have always found it more efficient to resist the temptation to kill the initial impulse to create by placing too many left brain oriented perceptions that this isn’t working or that doesn’t rhyme or this idea is stupid and that idea has been done. There is plenty of time for these impulses, but ultimately, it can be stifling to the creative process.

Co-writers

I have been very fortunate to have found some people to have collaborated with over the years. I have found that it can put you into a position to discover new angles on chord structure and lyrics, and ultimately it enriches your arsenal of tools and deepens your abilities to create more interesting songs. Every once in awhile I hit the wall, where I’ve played every chord sequence before and I’m repeating something I’ve written before, and nothing new is coming out. It is in those moments when it’s a good thing to start collaborating with other people with other ideas, and new chords and sequences and perspective. Ultimately it can inspire new directions in the music that you create on your own by exposing yourself to a new perspective.

Recording

Usually at some point, I come across something that is interesting enough to go onto the next phase, which is recording. I have a computer and an interface, so usually at this point, I turn on the computer. The first thing I do is to look at my notebook, and try to distill the ideas that I have into a printed version of my lyrics. There are many tweaks and changes that come along the way, but it’s easier for me to see the weaknesses of lyrical ideas if they’re printed on a piece of paper. This is just another phase of the critical aspect of the process, where I begin to attempt to perfect the ideas into a more coherent form. If I’m satisfied with that process, then I move onto the recording phase.

Usually, I pull out a metronome and find a good tempo for the song. I find that I tend to record things a little too slow the first time, so I tend to compensate by making the songs slightly faster than my first impulse. I then go dig into my sample cds to find an interesting rhythm that complements the guitar ideas that I have come up with. I have already basically structured the song with the lyric sheet, so I play the song over and over again until I can play it from beginning to end and it seems to make sense. Then I set up a microphone, and sing and play the song simultaneously, or I sing it in my head while recording the guitar part. I slowly start to build the instrumentation in a rough form, and then I record a series of vocal takes of the song. Many songs end at this moment. Sometimes I realize that it’s not really that interesting. But if it is, I start to build the harmonies, and get a basic rough draft of the song. Eventually I find a drummer to record drums to this version, and eventually I replace most if not all of the initial tracks to synchronize the music with the drum tracks.

I have been experimenting with different computer programs to expand my palette. I have written a few songs in Garage Band and Soundtrack which are two similar Apple programs which use loops to create finished music pieces. I used this technique with Catherine Beeks to write a song for Sam the Cooking Guy, and I’ve also written a couple of other songs that turned out pretty well, using a combination of loops and guitars, and in some cases, drums playing along with the loops. This can be quite tricky in my experience, and it’s rare to find a drummer that can play so accurately that the drums sync up with drum loops. I have used a program within Pro Tools called Beat Detective to smooth this process, and it seems to work well if this is what your intent is. Some say that this creates a more mechanical sounding drum part, but you’d be surprised at how many songs on the radio have undergone this process. That might be one of the reasons music has taken such a dive in that last few years but that’s another story I’m afraid.

Finally, usually after several years, I stop procrastinating and release an album of these songs. Lately, I’ve been focusing on two album’s worth of material that I’ve recorded with two different drummers, Jason Pratt, from Heavy Cessna, and Phil Woodring, from The Donnis Trio. I’ve been slowly confronting these tracks in hopes of releasing them soon, say in another three to five years…..

No, hopefully in 2009.

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