Snowglobe Songwriting

Ever see a snowglobe? It is a cute sealed container with a scene inside immersed in liquid that contains flakes of some substance that looks like snow. Everything inside looks still until you pick the snowglobe up and shake it then set it back down. Now there is a small snowstorm that livens up the entire view, and then it settles back down in new places to give you a different look inside that little world. Sometimes, we, as writers, need to do the same thing—shake things up in our musical world, get things moving, then let it settle down and see what we get. It’s been said that the definition of insanity is to do the same things and yet expect different results—so if what you are doing just isn’t working, here are some ideas to change things around and see if you start moving again, musically.

LEARN SOMETHING NEW

I have to admit, even after playing for over 30 years, I still don’t know how to play guitar. The sad truth, too, is that the bands I had that did the best had me in a lead or co-lead position and lead singer instead of just on rhythm guitar and vocals, or better yet, just vocals. When looked at by industry reps, they wanted to see my writing, not that of my fellow bandmates, and that made several of my bands break up. When I won awards, it was as a producer or songwriter, not as a vocalist. When you are confronted with these facts, sometimes you have to accept that perhaps you should try a different road to where you want to be--just get brave and try becoming better in the areas where reps would like to see you. In my case, perhaps I need to try and be my own lead guitarist, and get my vocals to the point where I can do them well while playing even more complex guitar parts. More guitar lessons and/or study would probably be in order, too, and might improve my songwriting. I never wanted to be a Clapton or Hendrix—I’d rather be another Stevie Nicks, to be honest, but I keep finding my talents keep being forced to the forefront by others, so perhaps it would be best to try this new path.

In your case, maybe you need to learn theory, learn to count, learn to write in a key other than A Blues or get your keyboard skills up to a par where you are doing more than pushing one note at a time. Take a class, get advice on where you can improve, get some new books and work on the exercises in them, or force yourself to put in more practice time to hone those skills.

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