Songwriting Tips Thread

[coryallen2]

I use my songs to tell what I can't tell anyone in "person" so to speak. Some of it makes a good song, but write songs from your heart and i bet they will be great.(Don't try to make yourself sound like your in a worse situation than you are) because then the song won't be as meaningful. Plus it's harder to remember a lie.

[Kay_Jay83]

Hey. So I am new to this forum and I definitely am glad to have found it because I have so many songs and am writing everyday. However I have a question, how do you get started shopping ur songs? Like once you write them, how do you get artists to hear them? Do you send them to their publicists or something? I just write. I don't know anything else about how to do the other stuff though. Any advice would help. Thanks!

[coryallen2]

Originally Posted by Kay_Jay83

Hey. So I am new to this forum and I definitely am glad to have found it because I have so many songs and am writing everyday. However I have a question, how do you get started shopping ur songs? Like once you write them, how do you get artists to hear them? Do you send them to their publicists or something? I just write. I don't know anything else about how to do the other stuff though. Any advice would help. Thanks!

Promote yourself. Make banners,websites,travel to recordign studios and radio stations. You will not get discovered SUPER FAST. But if your just doing song writing there are sites you can sell your work on. But be careful who you show your lyrics there are theifs out there. And if your as good as you think you are (cause your tryign to sell them already) They will want the music.

[VeggieLover]

I've always been good at writing free verse poetry, (if I may toot my own horn :O ) but the second I start to add the rhyme and more structured flow that is required of a song, I loose the imagery and unique flare that I'm proud of in my other work. Are there some excersices or guidelines that could help me out? Rhyme and I just don't get along, I haven't the slightest clue how to put it in there.

[VEGANGELICA]

Originally Posted by VeggieLover
I've always been good at writing free verse poetry, (if I may toot my own horn :O ) but the second I start to add the rhyme and more structured flow that is required of a song, I loose the imagery and unique flare that I'm proud of in my other work. Are there some excersices or guidelines that could help me out? Rhyme and I just don't get along, I haven't the slightest clue how to put it in there.

Hi, VeggieLover,
I *love* writing rhyming poetry (out of vogue in poetry circles) because of the chess-like challenge of trying to make sense while using meter and rhyme! Rhyming isn't necessary in songs, but I prefer it. I actually decided to start writing songs partly because it is a fun way for me to use my penchant for writing rhyming poetry.

I do three things when trying to write poetry that rhymes:

(1) I always start with the concept I want to convey. The concept produces a few words. When I have a word I want to use, I think of all the words that rhyme, then test them out and see what happens with each one...that is, what concept the word forces me to develop. It's like standing at a juncture of many streets and going down each one for a little while. This stage, for me, takes a lot of playing around with words and ideas and requires a lot of sheets of paper filled with many rough drafts, fragments of sentences, crossed-out lines, etc.

(2) I always read the lines out loud (not singing them)...as if I were just reading text...to feel if they flow or if they require me to accent words in odd places in order to keep some sort of meter (like iambic pentameter).

(3) I spend hours (really!) going over and over the lyrics, trying to improve them, shift things around, work out rough edges. I love the whole process, which for me is very time-consuming and absorbing.

You asked for an exercise to practice creating rhyming poetry. An exercise I've tried is to take one of my non-rhyming poems and convert it into a rhyming poem, working to retain as much of the meaning as possible. I'll try digging out an example of this and post it in my collection, if you want to see what I mean.

I hope you'll start your own VeggieLover Collection thread and share some of your free verse poetry and your rhyming songs. I think it is great that you toot your own horn, because, ya know, sometimes no one else will and so feeling happy about and satisfied with your own work is very important.
--Erica

[VeggieLover]

Thanks a lot VEGANGELICA, I just joined MusicBanter yesterday, and I'm already really glad that I did. Not only is the first person I talk to a fellow poet, but she is also a vegan (I'm assuming ) I feel at home already, and I will definitely be getting to work on some rhymes

[asshat]

Here are some good tips, in my amatuerish opinion.


1. Quantity eventually leads to Quality

Just open up the word processor and type type type...about a girl/boy, or sandwich or anything that comes to mind. This is the raw material that you can later craft into something good.

2. Make and record at least one whole song, no matter how lame it sounds

This gives you much needed discipline.Write at least one June/Spoon song with verse, bridge, and chorus now matter how derivative it might be. Eventually you'll become more fluent in lyric writing.

3. Writing lyrics shouldn't be too straining.

This is when your writing lyrics and you have to make every line sound profound. There is a difference between expressing a feeling/idea/mood vividly and writing a point by point description of it. The latter is the reason why Rush lyrics suck so hard.

[sunshineann]

I've always wanted to write my own songs but I just don't know how to get things flowing..Is there any advice someone can give me??

[charlieomar]

Hey sunshine. Start keeping a journal of everyday feelings, and basically whatever crosses your mind. You'll eventually begin to get in the habit, and things will start coming out stream of conscience style. I think you'll find that you can end up writing some pretty interesting/deep thoughts. Of course a song lyric or two can come from this process. :]

[Certif1ed]

Originally Posted by sleepy jack

k, people post whatever & we can argue out certain things.

1. Repeatin words

Its not really that bad I suppose, but if I see one word multiple times in a poem/song when another word can replace it, it just makes it sound less pretty. It works sometimes, (for instance in the goo goo dolls name "a tired song keeps playing on a tired radio) but alot of the times, it doesn't.

Good examples of this technique working; "She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah" (The Beatles), "I do I do I do I do I do" (ABBA), "Baby, baby, baby, baby oh baby" (The Carpenters).

It's not so bad, if you use the technique in the "right" way.

Originally Posted by sleepy jack

2. Revising

Alot of people don't do this, but typically after I write something I let it sit for a day then I go back and make notes on random verses "change word, make this flow etc..). Then I go back the next day and fix it, just so it can be more finished when i posted. I don't always do this, but it typically makes the lyrics better.

I find that when you're "On Fire" (ie, you don't have writer's block), it works much better to "splat" the lyrics down exactly as you feel them and change nothing.

When you write the music around the lyrics, the music expresses everything that needs to be changed about the words.

If you're lucky...

Originally Posted by sleepy jack

3. Writers Block

If i'm in a writers block, I don't just stop writing till I feel like im out of it. I try and write a bunch of things every day even if they suck just to keep in practice and to have some things to look back on.

I also try and get inspired, after reading a book I typically have something to write or if I walk through nature and take in the trees and the water and other such things. 'Cause alot of times, at least for me its not so much a writers block as a lack of inspiration.

WB and lack of inspiration are the same thing, and you're right. Discpline and hard work are the ticket out of the doldrums. Man, you've got more discipline than I have - I'm jealous!

If things suck, I get angry then give up. For a while, that is - when you're a writer, you feel compelled to write, even if you're going through a bad spell and just write poop. You simply have to do it because that's what you do. Or maybe that's just me...???

Originally Posted by sleepy jack

4. Influenced

Alot of people draw influences from certain writers (I do), and I use to just draw influence from writers in certain genres. Like, you can be ignorant of being influenced by a songwriter that you listen to alot, just cause you don't see it, it still could be there and if you just keep that to one genre, your writing is most likely just going to read like lyrics from that one genre. Which is why you should broaden your horizons.

Genius steals.

Beethoven "stole" from Mozart and Haydn in his early work. Didn't do him any harm later on.

Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin are legendary for stealing other people's music - as are Metallica. Seems funny that Metallica then get all heavy on people who "steal" their music, but let's not go there...

Originally Posted by sleepy jack

5. Writing About Your Feelings

Something that I do myself sometimes, & kind of annoys me. Is when you just say your sad over something, and don't really go into it. Explain why your sad, what made you sad and stuff. Actually get into and let the reader expierence what your feeling.

First point of strong disagreement;

This can be disastrous!

Often when I read lyrics that go "deep" into someone's feelings, I get completely sickened - like I'm searching through their dirty clothes basket or something, and seeing suspicious stains and other things I really don't want to see, thanks very much.

I'd rather make my own mind up - I prefer lyrics that are open, and paint a canvas for my imagination to run riot in - I don't really want the words to do the work for me, or it's like I'm not "playing" the music, it's trying to "play" me.

Originally Posted by sleepy jack

6. Originality

First of all, you wanna avoid cliche lines, and to be honest just nu-metal lyrics for the most part to see cliche lines. Linkin Park, KoRn, Slipknot and all that. Like, "walls are closing in", "im falling" and pretty much any metaphors where you use the word 'darkness' are cheesy and cliche. Being cliche can work, but most of the time it just doesn't.

If you wanna be original, don't describe the way someone else would describe a certain emotion. Write about how you feel about a certain thing, like how would you describe being sad or being dumped or something? Not how Green Day would describe it.

People use cliches because they work. That is the purpose of cliches. See above quote "Genius steals".

The thing with nicking someone else's ideas or styles is that you only have to do it a couple of times, and you can spread your net widely - and your own style begins to evolve quite quickly, if you've got the writing bug (ie, you're in the habit of writing).

How often have people said "Muse's early work sounds a bit like Radiohead", "Marillion's early work sounds a bit like Genesis", etc.

This usually does not hurt the band one iota.

In music, particularly, you cannot avoid cliches, even if you think that is what you are doing, because of the necessity to fit your style in with what is currently popular if you want to stand the remotest chance of flogging your stuff - so don't avoid 'em, embrace them!

Originally Posted by sleepy jack

7. Language

Swearing for swearings sake, is kind of weak. It can really add feel/emotion to a song if used right 'cause whenever I read a swear word I attack it to a feeling, anger or something.

When you write, you don't have to use big words, 'cause they don't automaticaly mean intelligence. If they're used wrong, then it just looks out of place and with small words, its kind of bland to read just words you hear frequently or are just well your typical words. You can still use little words and stray from every day words. Like, instead of saying "the chair broke" say "the chair splintered" or shattered or something. Its not some complicated rare word, but its not so overused.

Depends what you are writing and how you want it to come across.

Listen to "So What" by Crass (or Metallica's lame cover of it on the $5.98 Garage Days Revisited EP). Every other word of that song is obscene (hence no linkage as I respect other people's rights to NOT have obscenities flung in their face) - it is utterly revolting in places, but but the point of the song is never lost.

Then listen to "Fugazi" by Marillion. Not only are there long words, but there are many obscenely clever phrases with multiple meanings, references to Shakespeare, early 1980s Northern Ireland, and satirical social commentary among other things.




Where are the poets, indeed

Then listen to "Script for a Jester's Tear", also by Marillion.




No reason, except that the lyrics are amazing, and get better the more you listen to them because of their complexity and depth.

And they're nothing like Genesis, by the way...