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Joined: November 06 2012
Location: here
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Points: 8856
Posted: September 18 2015 at 10:33
SteveG wrote:
I felt that you were possibly confusing ambiguity, abstraction and surrealism, so my bad. I agree that abstract lyrics require images and proposed that the listener can supply these, which you felt was the listener writing the song. When a certain song hits someone with the feeling "Oh God, he wrote that song specifically for me", it's the listener relating the song to his own life experiences. It's the abstract scattershot approach that lets certain listeners have the illusion that they 'own' the song.
To be fair, I do know one or two people who respond to that. But only a rare sort of person is going to hang onto every word you say just because you are saying it. You have to grab their interest. Imagination, not lack thereof, inspires imagination. You can poke at mysteries which inspire the listener to use their imagination, but you can't present pureed language and expect them to fill in the blanks themselves. Most people will just turn their attention to the music, and, to be fair, sound based or placeholder lyrics are a perfectly valid form of lyricism. But you overestimate your audience if you think they will actually read into them, if you haven't first engaged them.
SteveG wrote:
These are lyrics from Harper's song Sleeping at the Wheel. So back to me point about being ambiguous. What do you think about these?
Through the window Just a wall Shapes are forming Blackbirds call Early morning spirits Moving hands Tick-tocking ages In the half-light of the still Before the lark Where I can feel my shadow Touch your silence in the dark Sleeping at the wheel reaching for oceans before us for us to feel together, tonight Playing eagle firing eyes ever willing sweet surprise Welling in the belly Of their chase Tracing out the angel In the half-light on your face Before the lark Where I can feel my shadow Touch your silence, in the dark Sleeping at the wheel reaching for oceans before us for us to feel together, tonight Then suddenly I hear you say "Time to get up It's gone midday, Cup of tea love" And I realize I must have dropped off drifted into dream before the lark yielded to the ether of our secret world in the dark
I interpreted this as a person waking up in the morning after a night of sex as if coming to reality. The more ambiguous imagery illustrates perhaps intoxication, but mostly just provides a contrast that emphasizes the "waking up" sensation. I could provide a line by line interpretation, but the point is that it interested me enough to do so. The language and the imagery took imagination to write and so provoked mine.
Joined: April 11 2014
Location: Kyiv In Spirit
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Points: 20604
Posted: September 18 2015 at 10:46
Right on! The actual music to this piece is a bit dreamy and ethereal, which adds some completely different dynamics to the interpretation, but the 'waking in the morning' scenario is intact.
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Joined: April 11 2014
Location: Kyiv In Spirit
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Points: 20604
Posted: September 23 2015 at 09:29
^This is truly powerful stuff that I had ponder over slowly verse by verse. Brilliant. Thank you for sharing your experiences that is both emotive and nuanced at the same time.
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Joined: April 18 2013
Location: KOBAIA
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Points: 1420
Posted: September 23 2015 at 14:38
Thanks, men! I appreciate your kind words. Also I did post about my project here too, where you can find previews of my current work and more stuff other than the tons of albums on bandcamp:
Joined: August 06 2015
Location: The Netherlands
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Points: 856
Posted: October 01 2015 at 13:49
For the making of my album I just made an orchestral intro, kind of cinematic. Should I add more layers or make the melody more clear (in the lo strings)?
Joined: May 25 2011
Location: Los Angeles, CA
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Points: 10970
Posted: February 19 2016 at 12:06
I think that what I should do is figure out how the changes work in songs, as well as how a song is built. Different artists try different tricks like twisting ABABCAB into something different and even add another musical idea (D or a coda when necessary); using modulation, tonicization, and unconventional cadences; and employing fancy chords like sus, slash (which are like extended chords), add, altered, etc.
Below are some changes that I've examined using the Roman numeral analysis. (If some of it is incorrect, please feel free to address it by posting your take on it or make a verbal suggestion. Some of the changes are confusing but make sense when you hear them.) The reason I did this is to help us all with writing issues when it comes to form and progressions. It appears that I haven't decided whether I should use the classic shorthand or the jazz notation for the chord nomenclature.
On additional note, I've come to realize that some writers have halves of their verses sounding somewhat different; it doesn't have to be the same progression throughout the stanza. Same goes for refrains. Hence my use A(1st half of verse), a(2nd half of verse), B(1st half of chorus), b(2nd half of chorus).
I definitely want to learn to play the first three songs on the piano or acoustic guitar as I find them to be very soulful and rather easy to execute in a short amount of time.
Joined: May 25 2011
Location: Los Angeles, CA
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Points: 10970
Posted: March 10 2016 at 10:18
Question to fellow musicians: between mood, personality, and having a strong lyrical theme, which of these qualities is the most important to you in songwriting?
My vote goes for mood, as it breathes life into music.
Joined: May 25 2011
Location: Los Angeles, CA
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Points: 10970
Posted: March 12 2016 at 01:49
^ Wouldn't it make more sense if you worked them out in a certain order (instead of getting hung up on all elements at once)? Mulling over songwriting techniques, I've figured that in order to (at the very least) breath life into a song you have to set a certain mood on your own terms, by means of experimentation, or starting with a bass-drum groove, or playing rich, intricate changes, or inserting a lo-fi recording from an external source, or any other way. In fact, you could even start an improvisation with any of those ideas and move on. Then you can worry about melody or just completing the song with the rest of the sections.
Joined: May 28 2011
Location: NH
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Points: 344
Posted: March 19 2016 at 10:51
My brother and I released our first album, called Sharks on a Plane! It's mostly surf rock with some mathy sensibilities: https://blankspacerecords.bandcamp.com/album/sharks-on-a-plane
Joined: August 06 2015
Location: The Netherlands
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Points: 856
Posted: March 19 2016 at 17:36
@Dayvenkirq: my tracks almost always have a kind of "function" in the album. This results in a certain mood I want to present. Beginning with chords and tempo. Then rythms and bass lines. Or something else that you suddenly find and that could be useful. But another way which is maybe done to death but still accepted and a great way is starting out with a motif, or any other recognisable thing (could be a particular sound or maybe even chord) and building around that- variations, contramelodies, etc.
By the way, could you explain what, for you, is the difference between mood and personality?
Joined: November 06 2012
Location: here
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Points: 8856
Posted: March 21 2016 at 00:55
Dayvenkirq wrote:
^ Wouldn't it make more sense if you worked them out in a certain order (instead of getting hung up on all elements at once)? Mulling over songwriting techniques, I've figured that in order to (at the very least) breath life into a song you have to set a certain mood on your own terms, by means of experimentation, or starting with a bass-drum groove, or playing rich, intricate changes, or inserting a lo-fi recording from an external source, or any other way. In fact, you could even start an improvisation with any of those ideas and move on. Then you can worry about melody or just completing the song with the rest of the sections.
Forgot to reply. Well, it normally does happen in a certain order. My personality doesn't really come through my music unless it has the mood I want (thought it's sometimes vice versa). And, for me, lyrics normally happen after the music's done. Having a lyrical personality, theme, and mood, though, is a different story. That's really what I meant by mediating between the three. I'm still not as skilled a lyricist as I am a composer, so I often have to spend extra time on the lyrics.
Joined: November 06 2012
Location: here
Status: Offline
Points: 8856
Posted: March 21 2016 at 01:01
N-sz wrote:
My brother and I released our first album, called Sharks on a Plane! It's mostly surf rock with some mathy sensibilities: https://blankspacerecords.bandcamp.com/album/sharks-on-a-plane
Here's a sample:
Nice stuff. I just got into Dick Dale recently, actually, so I can dig his influence on this track.
Question to fellow musicians: between mood, personality, and having a strong lyrical theme, which of these qualities is the most important to you in songwriting?
My vote goes for mood, as it breathes life into music.
Not to be contrarian, but for me melody has the highest priority. A strong melody is what people will take away from your song the most.
Although the melody does affect the mood quite a bit. This is something for me to think about.
Joined: May 25 2011
Location: Los Angeles, CA
Status: Offline
Points: 10970
Posted: May 30 2016 at 10:59
^ Sorry for my late reply.
Interesting answer. The mood affecting the melody could be the case. However, as someone who is melodically challenged when writing a song, I try to start with some lyrical/vocal melody first, which in turn could determine the mood.
I've been thinking about my latest reply's content and figured that mood is supposed to be an extension of your personality. As for the matter of having a strong lyrical theme, perhaps this should be thought of later, as my personal experience has shown that starting with music rather than lyrics can guarantee better writing of a song, which is where personality comes in (through texture, i.e. how you write harmony, melody, rhythm).
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SteveG wrote:
