52songs is my project to write one song every week this year, no matter how terrible. By hook or by crook.

Momma Bear

This week was interesting for a number of reasons.  I hit a number of roadblocks but had some great friends/mentors who helped me jump the barriers (including the ones that forced me into publishing on the very last day of the week).  Here's what this process was like...

I had the basics of the rhythm part, and was working on a melody.  I knew what I wanted the song to be about (or thought I did) and couldn't figure it out.  Then I randomly started thinking about my mom, and that this week was her birthday, and then I realized I was writing a song about her, and things were falling together really quickly.

For lyrics, I sat down and free associated some thoughts about my mom.  Here's some of the things that I wrote down:

• My mom had seven kids, and probably would have loved to have more.
• Last week, I called my mom to ask her about her plans for her dad's funeral to find out that she didn't know.  I don't need to point out that I'm not the most sensitive guy, and I wasn't prepared, so I felt really bad about being the bearer of bad news.
• Mom has probably 5 stories about me as a kid that she tells EVERYONE. I tried my best to incorporate some of those into the song.
• My mom is fearless.  My mom is a momma bear in the best way ever: she's emotional.  Don't mess with her cubs, because whether you deserve her wrath or not, you're gonna get it.

After I got everything together, I suddenly hated this song.  I hated it. HATED. IT.  It was juvenile, and shallow.  Then I thought about my mom, and that she would love it, much like all those pictures that she would hang on the fridge when I'd bring them home from (high) school.  No one else mattered.

And then I thought I needed to polish it more.  GarageBand and Logic are horrible for composing.  Horrible.  They have hundreds of instruments and all sorts of effects.  I got lost in recording this beast.  I'd written the song, but were getting caught up in producing the song.  I had a good friend who sent me an email about it (posted with permission):

Just [expletive] record it.  Use a tape recorder if need be.  Throw out autotune and effects pedals and reverb and drum machines.  Write the song.  Record it. Publish it. Walk away.  Who cares if it sounds cheesy, and you couldn't get the vocals right.  Your project is to WRITE a song a week, not produce an album-ready song every week.

Writers write a book and then it's set in stone. Musicians dont have that problem. Every time we perform the song, it can be a new song. You can keep [expletive] with it, and you should.  It'll suck the first 100 times you play it, and then it'll be awesome.

Just record the [expletive] song.

So yeah, it's a horrible recording.  I learned a lot about Logic, and will probably use it again to do this, although not right away.  Outside of learning to program drums, I think a single-take recording is probably fine.

I suck.

I'm finishing up this week's 52songs song.  It's been good exercise for me, I've gotten to convey the things I wanted to convey, but I can't help but think "This song isn't as great as I think it should be."  It probably could be better.  I could be a better guitar player.  I could play piano better.  I could sing better.

The more I think about it though, I don't write these songs to not suck. I write these songs because it's helping me grow. It's helping me think about music.  It's helping me be creative.  It's helping me put myself out there and be vulnerable and experience that sharing.

I'm reminded of a JFK quote when he talked about going to the moon:

We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not only because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.

So yeah, I suck.  But I don't do write music because it is easy. I do it because it's hard.  I do it because (most importantly) it makes me happy, even though I suck at it.  One day, maybe I'll suck less at it.  If I don't, I'm going to continue sucking, and enjoying life sucking.

As with all of the things that break the threshold of my brain enough to be blogged about, this one comes with a change of thought for me.  I don't want to tell anyone they suck.  I don't even want to tell anyone they could "be better."  I want to be a cheerleader for the world.  I want to cheer people on to do things they never thought they could do, and keep trying the things they want to do.

I encourage you to join me on this journey.

52songs is my project to write one song every week this year, no matter how terrible. By hook or by crook.

I'll Go With You by knoxvillerecital

I co-wrote this song with Keaton Simons.  It's technically the first song I've written/performed/recorded in a very long time.  It was the kick that got me writing music again.  I came to Keaton with a chord progression, he found a melody, we free-associated some lyrics, and it all seemed to come together.

We wrote the song for my wife.  The song is titled "I'll Go With You" because her greatest fear is that I'll die before her and she'll be left here.  The song serves as my way of saying "No matter where you go here on earth, I'll go, and I won't leave until you do."