By Andy Price, Music Radar | You can be working on one of the most gloriously uplifting chord progressions ever written, have a melody that nobody listening could ever forget, or be mixing a track where every instrument sounds punchy and streaming-ready. But a song isn’t finished UNTIL it’s finished.
Songwriting is really the art of marrying all those disparate elements that constitute ‘an amazing song’ together, and – while the individual parts might shine in isolation, it’s how they work in unison that really matters.
But getting things right can take time. It can also lead you to long nights locked away, constantly repeating a once amazingly exciting verse chord sequence or melody until you discover, say, a route into a chorus part that works equally as well.
That perseverance can sometimes pay off, but a lot of times that repetition can lead you to repeatedly hit brick walls. Eventually, the joy and promise of that initial spark begins to fade.
As a songwriter and home producer myself, the amount of times I have sat staring at expansive Logic projects, being unsure of which part to tweak next has slowly shattered many a promising idea. That sense of defeat can be the result of a grinding realization that, after the fifteenth take of a riff, beat or sequence, this is all starting to feel like work.
Indecision is something that can gnaw at your confidence, and make you question your creative abilities. If it isn’t engaged with, it can have a toxic, detrimental effect on your mental health.
Until quite recently, I had never been able to fully embrace the thought that, even when you’re not directly working on a piece of music, that those creative gears keep turning in the background.
But, stepping away from the active ‘making’ process and doing something else – going for a walk, watching TV, reading a book, hanging out with a friend – can be an effective way of lowering your anxiety levels and, if you’re truly invested in what you’re making enough, your brain can quite often dish up the solution. Ideas can seemingly manifest right out of thin air.
Legendary songwriter Neil Young espoused this way of handling songwriting blockages. A quote widely attributed to him (although the original source appears to be somewhat nebulous) imparts the following wisdom: “If you don’t have an idea and you don’t hear anything going over and over in your head, don’t sit down and try to write a song. Go mow the lawn.”
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Read more on this inspiring idea here:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/music/news/if-you-don-t-have-an-idea-go-mow-the-lawn-follow-neil-young-s-lead-to-demolish-those-frustrating-songwriting-barriers/