I recently posted a review of the new Toontrack software EZ Keys at my other site, Beards And Gear. I raved about the abilities that it has, and the benefits that it presents to me as a songwriter, arranger, and producer. Much to my surprise, although I’m surprised that I’m surprised, I’ve received several emails about how much people hate EZ keys at the philosophical level. One person equated EZ keys to a Hallmark greeting card that plays music. The question is, is that a fair comparison?

With the advent of EZ Keys, EZ Drummer, EZ Mix, Auto-Tune, Electri6ity, and several other pieces of software that can automate the task of music creation, are we now at a point where you can simply drag and drop a hit song? Can you copy and paste your way to stardom, bypassing all avenues of originality and creativity?

If you turn on mainstream radio there is definitely a cookie cutter effect going on, and you hear the same formula being applied again and again. Danceable beat, catchy hook, chorus “sung” by guy who can’t sing smothered in Auto-Tune, and some canned music happening in the background that you’re quite certain you’ve already heard. It’s pretty easy to take one listen and start cursing the heavens for ever sending us software like the EZ family, or Auto-Tune, but is it really their fault? If you could build a house using a power nailer rather than an old school hammer, wouldn’t you? Isn’t using technology to become more efficient a good thing? Are we losing originality as we go down this path?

None of these are really fair questions, and it’s not really fair to blame software for anything. There has been unoriginal garbage music for as long as there have been recordings. As much as we would love to get nostalgic and think that the great eras of whatever genre have come and passed, and originality ran rampant back in the day, it’s just simply not the case. Pop music has always been appealing to the masses, which by definition means that it can’t be super original. Originality is alienating, as it automatically excludes people who won’t be into that specific type of music. Alienation doesn’t sell records, and unsold records don’t sustain the music industry. That being said, you can catch glimpses of originality, even amongst all of the auto-tuned, drag and drop music, if you’re really listening.

Software is just a tool. If you can drag and drop a piano arrangement that sounds perfect, and like it was played by a professional pianist, it doesn’t mean that you’re music is now unoriginal, or lacking in creativity. Similarly, just because some of the greatest guitarists in the world have arranged their songs alongside a drum machine, it doesn’t mean that they are unoriginal either. The originality may come in the lyrics, in the arrangement, in the production, or maybe in the instrumentation. Maybe it comes in the presentation, the live show, the packaging, or any of the other hundred aspects that are involved in music creation.

My point is that blaming software for the current state of unoriginal pap being played on the radio is just an easy out. Unoriginal people make unoriginal music, and yes they may use software, but they could have just as easily have done it by hiring studio musicians, professional lyricists, and professional arrangers. Just because there are more humans involved doesn’t make something creative, and just because there may be one human with 20 titles of software, doesn’t make it uncreative. Focus on the end result, and don’t worry about how you’re getting there. Use a hammer, use a nailer, use a rock, or use a space age laser guided nail cannon from another planet! If you’re going to build a great house, the tools just simply don’t matter.

Luke

Recently the process has changed quite a bit. I’ve been making a conscious effort to take more time in the songwriting process, really hashing out the lyrics, and the structure of the song. I like to ask a few questions during the process:

1. Does this progression, or arrangement compliment the subject matter of the song?

2. Could a different arrangement make this song more enjoyable, more meaningful?

3. Most importantly, are these lyrics the best possible way to say what I’m thinking, or feeling?

In doing this it’s led to a lot of revisions, and even some outright restarts. I used to take the 60′s approach of three chords and a message. Well, maybe not that simple, but I used to think that the lyrics alone comprised the meaning of the song, and that the melody, arrangement, etc were just there to make it more catchy than spoken word poetry. I’ve since come to realize that sometimes the music, the arrangement, or even a simple melody can add more to the song than words ever could. The sum is greater than the parts.

That may not seem like a major revelation to some of you, but to me it was pretty huge. I realized that for me the lyrics are the main entree, and the other components of the song are the side dishes. The meal wouldn’t be complete without all of them, as much as I may be enjoying the main entree. The next time you’re writing a song, really look at what you focus on mostly. Are you putting most of your thought and energy into the lyrics? If so, try really honing in on the arrangement next time, and treating the lyrics with a bit less attention. Maybe you have a ton of trouble with writer’s block when it comes to lyrics, but you can churn out musical arrangements all day long. Next time you sit down to write, write ONLY lyrics, then wait a day and try to come up with an arrangement to fit the lyrics. Challenge yourself. I think you’ll find that limitation sparks creativity. Cage an animal and watch how quickly, and creatively it finds a way to escape. Leave them in the wide open, and they’ll probably just take a nap.

Awesome metaphor? yeah, I thought so.

Luke

A conversation with a coworker sparked this little topic in my head the other night. The topic is the question of “Why?” Have you ever asked yourself why you make music? More importantly why you’re writing songs. If you’re reading this blog I assume you either ARE writing songs, want to write songs, or have absolutely no life and are reading about a topic you’re not interested in. But I think they made Youtube for people like that. So assuming that you want to write songs, have you ever asked yourself why? What is your motivation for doing this? After making music for as many years as I can remember, I really had never asked this question.

We musicians, or artists, tend to consider ourselves pretty contemplative when compared with your average American Joe Citizen. So why is it that I, a guy who has wasted hours and hours of his life pondering the unanswerable questions of life, had never asked myself the simple question of “Why do I make music?” When I thought about it, the answer was simple enough. I quite cleverly, if I do say so myself, said to him, “To keep the demons at bay.” In other words, it’s a creative outlet for me. Everyone needs one, and this is mine. What other reason could there be?

Apparently there are lots of reasons to make music, and all must be considered by YOU! What if you’re reason for writing songs is to make money? Maybe you’ve sold out before you’ve even sold a song, and you’re writing them just to further increase the number of terrible unoriginal songs on the radio. Maybe you’re writing songs to get girls. Maybe you’re writing to fulfill an educational or professional requirement. Whatever the reason is, you must know it, and play to it.

Take me for example. I’m writing songs strictly for myself. There was a time when I tried to make music a commercial endeavor and it didn’t work for me. I didn’t enjoy it, I got bored with it, and didn’t really care too much for myself while I was doing it. Now that I’m making music strictly for my own creative outlet, I have no restraint. I write exactly what I want to write, and that’s that. If a line doesn’t make sense to the audience, I really don’t care. If a line offends the audience, I also don’t care. If a song isn’t at all liked by the audience…I think you get the point. For me the point of making music is to “get it out,” and there’s no way for me to do that while also trying to tailor it to an audience. I have to throw all caution to the wind.

Conversely, if I were writing songs to make a living, I would need to consider my audience first and foremost. Who am I marketing this song to? What topics, structures, or styles are playing well in that audience right now? Where do I think those trends will head, and how can I meet them there? The question should always be asked, “How will my audience respond to this song?” That should take priority over whether or not you are in love with the song.

Maybe you’re writing songs to get girls. As silly as it sounds, it’s not too far fetched. I can remember a skinnier, less beardier me playing a gig in high school and being so concerned about what the girls in the audience thought of me. Or in a broader sense, let’s just say you’re writing songs that will be marketed mostly to girls. Then the content, style, and most importantly the packaging will need to be very different than a song written for the average consumer. Think the Disney music machine, and you’re on the right track.

The list goes on and on, but you get the picture. Ask why you’re making music, and then ask yourself how you’re music is currently achieving that goal. In addition, don’t be ashamed of whatever your reasons may be. If you’re making music just to try to make money, don’t worry about people calling you a sell out, or greedy. You are what you are, so just embrace it. They’ll probably be calling you a sellout from a pay phone in a bad neighborhood while you’re speaking to them on your diamond plated cell phone in your platinum plated space ship somewhere on Mars. They have those, right?

If you’re making music strictly for your own enjoyment, then be proud of it. Don’t let people bring you down by saying that you need to gig, or need to sell records, or need to do anything differently. If it’s for you, and you’re happy, then you’re golden. You’ll probably be the envy of other musicians because of the freedom you’re allowed. Of course the sacrifice is commercial success, and public notoriety. If those things matter, then reevaluate why you’re doing this and change direction. In the end, you’ll probably realize that your answer to the “Why” question is a combination of many answers, and you’ll have to adjust your approach accordingly. Maybe you’ll be the next Radiohead, making the music you want to make, and somehow making millions at it.

Or maybe you’ll be the next Bieber, and you’ll get the chicks and the cash. Or maybe you’ll be the next me, and get just one chick and the creative outlet that you need. Just figure out where you want to go, and then you can worry about getting there.

Luke

If you’re a songwriter, who also records the majority of his/her own material in your home studio then you’ve probably struggled with this problem as much as I have. The problem of when to know when the songwriting has finished and when the recording has begun.

Prior to the days of home studios being so common, and so accessible, you would write your songs, work through the arrangements with other musicians, polish it up, then head into the studio to do the recording. Normally you’d try to finish things up in as few takes as possible, and get out fast, because the clock was running, and studio time wasn’t, well still isn’t really, cheap. With the dawn of the home studio, and more importantly, with things becoming faster, bigger, better, and cheaper this process has changed drastically. Now there aren’t really time restrictions playing against you. You’re in your own home so if you spend 4 weeks tracking the same 30 second guitar part, and use up 20GB worth of hard drive space on scratch takes, it doesn’t really matter. For all intents and purposes hard drive space is endless, and you’re on your own clock so it’s essentially free, right? This seems like a huge advantage, not working under the gun. You can relax, take your time, and really get things perfect. But therein lies the problem.

I’ve been a musician for the better part of my life, and a songwriter for the last decade, and if there is one thing that I have learned it’s that I’ve never considered myself done. When I was focussing mostly on drumming, I never thought to myself, “This is it, I will never be a better drummer than I am today.” I was always changing, evolving, learning new skills, honing old ones, changing the way I thought about playing. The same goes for songwriting. Every year for the last 10 years I’ve taken a look back at the songs I’ve written that year, and every year they are better than the songs in the previous year. At least in my oh so humble opinion, my songs have gotten better and better, every single year, without fail. So much so, that the songs I wrote a few years ago aren’t even fun for me to play now. They just seem undeveloped, or amateur, or even boring. It could also be that the emotions that led to those songs, have fizzled in the last few years, and gave way to new emotions, but that’s another topic altogether. We’re talking about the pure structure, and layout of the song. How much do I want to listen to that song myself? If not very much, then there’s the test.

How does that relate to what I’m discussing here? Well if you’re like me, and always improving, which I think is the case for every musician, then where do you draw the line? You can spend as much time recording songs as you’d like, spend as much time getting every part perfect, but where do you stop? You’re better than you were last week, so shouldn’t you rerecord the guitar part you laid down last week? Shouldn’t you rewrite that last verse, or change the arrangement of the song entirely? And even if you don’t feel that way as a writer, have you improved your engineering skills? Maybe purchased a new, and better mic, or a new interface? Should you rerecord for the sake of rerecording, rather than the sake of songwriting? Should you fall into the trap of so many home recordists, and polish the same group of songs for years? This is why it becomes so critical to really get it straight in your head, which portion of the musical process you’re working on. Are you writing, or recording? Each of those two tasks has so many sub levels that it gets a bit mind-boggling, like writing lyrics, working on arrangements, melodies, tracking, mixing, mastering, editing, etc. I’m not going to delve into those here, but for now just start by asking yourself the question of “Am I writing or recording?” Make sure you’re not doing both at the same time.

The lines can get blurry fast if you work anything like I do. When I’m writing a song, I’m almost always recording. I’ll usually start with a basic arrangement of some kind. Sometimes it’s drums, bass, and guitar, other times, just guitar, sometimes just drums. It varies, but often times this process starts on my computer. If you have a basic guitar part laid down, you can loop it, and leave your mind completely free to focus on lyrics, or melody, or what the next portion should sound like. If you have a basic beat, you leave yourself wide open to create a guitar portion to fit within it. You give yourself a foundation to build on rather than just blank space to try to fill. I find it helps me compartmentalize what I’m working on, or writing. The obvious problem is that while this is the “writing” process for me, I’m actually recording everything. And because I’m an engineer as well, if the guitar track I just laid down is a bit boomy, it will drive me nuts. I’ll throw an EQ on there. Then maybe a compressor on the drum buss. Then a basic reverb. Suddenly I’ve gone all the way to mixing, and I’m supposed to be writing. The result can be that I jump the gun on things, and end up with a poorly written song, that is mixed really well. You have to monitor yourself and catch yourself in the act of doing this. If you’re writing, then just work on the writing, even if you are recording it.

Along the same lines, if you’re in the recording stages, then do everything in your power to avoid rewriting. Accept the song as it is, and treat it almost as if you’re just the engineer, not the songwriter. Pretend it’s someone else’s song and your job is to get the pieces recorded and mixed, as good as you possibly can. Doing this will help prevent you from getting into a constant loop of rewriting, rerecording, rewriting again, rerecording, remixing, etc. Always know if you’re recording or writing, and know that even though they may use some of the same tools, they are a very different process.

I’ll be back with more posts soon. Until then shoot on over to beardsandgear.com to hear me ramble about more recording related topics.

Until Next Time
Luke