WRITING MODE

IT’S TIME … TO GET SOME SONGS FINISHED

What with Folk In The Road in full gig mode, work, dogs, kids and just general stuff I have not put the necessary time in to putting music to a backlog of lyrics sitting forlornly in my lyrics book. I never seem to run out of lyrics and certainly with the band collaborating on some songs there have been a few that have got up … and let’s face in the world today there is no shortage of “material” out there.

I have always been a lyrics first writer, not something I have ever really had to think about as I don’t ever sit down to write lyrics I just transfer what gets faxed in to my head from the patron saint of songwriting (whoever that is) on to paper. However at that point they are just stories, poems, OpEds, or letters to the Editor … applying the music is another matter. The music has to suit the song is it light and airy or rockin angst, a finger picker or a strummer … and it has to be playable live … considering the guitar skills of the performer.

So I am on the platform now and ready to pump out some new songs and start moving some lyrics from the lyrics book to the finished songs book. The Titles and the lyrics are there Vocabulary, Lunch At The Hotel Moskva, Shapes In The Clouds, Academic Toys, Kaneohe Still … the list goes on.

Then there are three remaining problems … learning the song, getting it to performance level and then getting out there and playing them … oh and one more for every one I finish I wind up writing two more and the lyric book never seems to decrease in size … oh the lot of a serious songwriter.