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Despite my somewhat underwhelming reputation in the music business, I have been asked on occasion – usually by woefully uninformed novices – how to write music. Wow, this is kind of a heavy topic, I mean so many ways to address it. In order to save you from the unintelligible ramblings of someone who is not the most brilliant music theoreticians, I will skillfully side-step the technical aspects and move into the more esoteric aspects of writing good music. 

Why are guys like Lennon and McCartney, Page and Plant and Sir Elton and Bernie Taupin so successful? I find that it’s because you have in these relationships the consummate lyricist and the consummate musician existing side-by-side. If Morrison was the poet, then Manzarek, Krieger and Densmore were the guys who set that poetry to music and they would not have been The Doors without that combination. It helps to know what you’re stronger in. I, for example have worked with pretty fair lyricists and some good musicians, and I find that I definitely fit in the lyricist category. I once heard The Edge of U2 comment that most of their songs were written on one string. That’s my philosophy, and I’m not being entirely facetious in that. I can see the logic that a “music” writer goes through in developing a song, but for the life of me, I have not been able to replicate that in my own dabblings. Realizing your own limitations is half the battle. There are some extraordinary people who are capable of writing both music and lyrics, but these are few and far between (and what is “… the pompitous of love” anyway). Find what you are good at and make that, either writing music or lyrics, your primary mission. That’s not to say that you should not do both, at least as an exercise in perspective. I think it’s extremely valuable to stretch yourself on a personal and professional basis, but it’s my opinion that you stand a better chance of scoring success long term by finding a philosophical Yin to your Yang. And it need not be only one person either. Many successful songs have been written as part of a group effort. 

Once you’ve found your niche, it’s important to have a process in place for you to be productive. When I first realized that I would have to get a real job to put food on the table after college, I went into the information technology field. Now anyone who has worked in this area knows that they are really big on developing repeatable processes so that once they’ve successfully done something, they can keep going back to do it the same way. As an artist at heart, I rebelled against this notion. “It thwarts the creativity process,” I railed. Well, turns out that they may have been on to something. While having things too tightly structured may be a hindrance to creativity, having a set way of going about songwriting in general may be a great help. For example, let’s say you are a California band and you really want to emulate the Eagles, so you go into the studio with the mindset that you’re going to write a Southern rock song in 4/4 time only using this standard set of chords. Chances are, you’re going to be a pretty boring band. But, if you go into it saying, this is the style of music I feel comfortable with, we’re going to come in every day at 8:00 a.m., whether we feel like it or not, write until lunchtime, whether what we write is any good or not, and then after lunch write for a couple of more hours. By building that habit of writing at a certain time, for a certain amount of time, you’re creating a process that will produce consistently good songs with some flashes of brilliance. The reason is not because the process itself makes you any better, but it does produce a considerable amount of work that lets you get your ideas down on paper. Later you can separate the wheat from the chaff, and you won’t feel rushed to turn out a masterpiece in a day to fill in that last spot on the CD. 

That in a nutshell is what I tell those who ask me for advice on writing music. When I reflect on what else I could have told them I keep coming back to the same conclusion, that if I had gotten down to the nuts and bolts of lyricism and musical structure, it really would not have helped much. All of the knowledge in the world will not help you if you do not have that spark. There’s a certain intuitiveness to songwriting that no one can teach. It’s the same reason that I don’t write music very well. I know chords, scales, structure and theory, but putting it all together escapes me. So I putter along and if I come up with an interesting progression, I go to my friend Steve and he takes it and runs with it. When he’s done, he gives the finished product back to me and I add the lyrics. It’s a system that works well, and although we’ll never be famous, we have fun, because each of us knows our unique gift, and we’ve learned how to use them together. 

For a musician, your songs are your art. They are the physical embodiment of your creative gifts. Every bit of anger, happiness, angst, joy, pain, elation, knowledge or humor goes into the story known as your song. You write and re-write it, scouring over each note and word…perfecting it for recording and live performance. 

But when you play it for others, you’re not getting the reaction you expected. Your friends, fans and family seem less than enthusiastic as they dully respond, “Yeah. That was…um…good.” How could this be? You poured your soul into this piece. This was your “Stairway To Heaven”! This was your “Smells Like Team Spirit”! It’s a lyrically amazing ode about the persecution of pagan midwives in grass hut tribes! It flows, it breathes, and it’s seven and a half minutes of pure musical perfection! 

Whoa. Stop right there, Mozart. You wrote a seven and a half minute song about the persecution of pagan midwives in grass hut tribes and you’re wondering why you’re thirteen year-old cousin fell asleep in the middle of the fourth verse? You wrote a seven and a half minute song about the persecution of pagan midwives in grass hut tribes and you’re confused as to why your drummer’s girlfriend began calling her friends on her cell phone before the song had reached its bridge? 

It may be hard to believe when you’re penning an opus such as this, but the normal human brain is wired a little differently than an accomplished musician’s, like yourself. And although music is art, it’s also popular culture and the goal should be for others to enjoy your creative efforts as much as you do. 

So, how can you make sure that your writing experience is as positive as your audience’s listening experience? What can you, as musicians do, to eliminate aspects of your songs that may alienate, confuse or just plain bore your fans? 

The following are a few tips that may add success to your songwriting experience: 

1.) After Four Minutes, It Becomes Background Music---Music aficionado’s aside, the average person has roughly the attention span of a young adult hummingbird. As a songwriter, you need to grab your audience’s attention and hold it until the end of the song before they flit off to something else more interesting to them. Although four minutes (or less) may seem like the blink of an eye when a songwriter is storytelling, it’s a very long time to expect your run-of-the-mill club-goer or web-surfer to stay fixated on your music. 

2.) Tell Your Story As Directly As Possible---We all love allusions, allegories, vague references, and subtle metaphors but use them sparingly or become a beat poet. A little abstractness goes a long way when writing a popular song. Song lyrics fly into people’s minds as quickly as the bassist plucks out quarter notes. If you make your lyrics too complicated, then your audience may still be trying to figure out the verse when you’re already playing the chorus. This could prompt the average listener to tune out your masterpiece, order another beer and switch on their Ipod. 

3.) If English Is Your First Language, Use It In Your Song---It’s great that you’re an educated, cultured, artistic intellectual sponge. But remember that most people who hear your music are not book worms or art whores. Big, involved words make for memorable song lyrics but use them occasionaly. It’s good for your fans to ponder the meaning of a particular lyric but give them too many to ponder and they’ll get so caught up in the words that they may forget your song. 

4.) Obscure Musicality Can Be Confusing Too---Lyrics aren’t the only way to confuse the average listener. Obscure time signatures, discordant instrumentation and avant guard drum lines may seem like genius to your fellow musicians, but if your listeners can’t tap and/or hum along, you may find yourself only invited to perform in underground opium bars where the audience members have all had one too many hash brownie. 

If you’re not sure where to begin, start simple. Write a short, but sweet, song that packs an emotional punch in a universal way. Write about something everyone is familiar with: love, politics, lifestyle issues or the sociology of being a human being on the planet. Once people have fallen in love with your music, it will be easier to get them to give the extra listen to your more complicated, artistic pieces. 

Remember that just because a song is popular or easily understood, doesn’t mean that it’s not good creativity. Art is subjective, and truly in the eye of the beholder. Your least favorite song could be someone else’s favorite. You never have to stop being creative or artistic, just acknowledge that there’s an audience out there that wants to hear what you have to say…but they’ll need to be able to comprehend it first.