Defeating Writer’s Block

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Guitarrista
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Jun 13, 2017
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Florida
I thought it might be cool to share how we overcome writer’s block in our own ways. For me whenever I get stuck trying to figure out what should come next in a song it never fails me to sit on my couch and play the guitar completely unplugged. I think it’s because it enables me to focus on melody/harmony without any distraction since it strips down the guitar to its most basic sound.

I know some of my buddies will switch to a different instrument (not another guitar but a completely different instrument type) when they get stuck. Anyone else got any tricks that seem to work for them?
 
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Having a relationship with my songwriting goals (i.e., reading them) helps me to recenter. It's easy for me to avoid facing my discomfort and do unproductive music adjacent things (e.g., shop for guitars, noodle). Lyrics also seem to be my glue for things to stick, but that may be a songwriting maturity thing. I can make pure guitar chords and melodies sound good, but they don't seem to go anywhere without there being a lyric based vocal melody.
 
I have been trying to figure this out for years. I am definitely my own worst critic. Every time I start to create something I end up not liking it and deleting it. I have mixed enough for other people that I know you can't just something based off of one track. It is the sum of the parts that you are working towards. The problem I have is I know enough about music theory and structure that I think my own stuff sounds like a grade school kid wrote it and put it together. I know it isn't a hit song and not even in the same state as a hit song. I have had a few things both musically and lyrically that after they were gone I wish I had them back.

I think I have learned my lesson. I started doing something different this year. It is going slow but I am trying to stay determined. I started studying music theory again and going over things I have known for years that were not necessarily top of mind for me. I am trying to reconnect with things to come up with some more complex progressions and lyrics. I spent some money and bought some more material recently and that has kept me interested, so far. I am sure that I am going to get bogged down with building progressions but I am ready to start doing that. I am hoping that working some modal stuff into this will help get me to where I am finally happy with the results. One thing is for sure, I WILL NOT delete any thing going forward if I don't like it. I will save it and revisit it down the road and see if I can fix what I don't like.

I also have another thought in my head of how I am going to approach something I tried to start on here and will be revisiting that as well. My goal is to try to get some of me in musical format completed and released and get my playing enjoyment out of creating new music instead of staying up late on the weekends playing in bars to get enjoyment out of playing. I do love being on stage and watching people have fun with the music I am helping make and that will be missed. I am just not a big fan of the late nights anymore with having a day job.
 
I have been trying to figure this out for years. I am definitely my own worst critic. Every time I start to create something I end up not liking it and deleting it. I have mixed enough for other people that I know you can't just something based off of one track. It is the sum of the parts that you are working towards. The problem I have is I know enough about music theory and structure that I think my own stuff sounds like a grade school kid wrote it and put it together. I know it isn't a hit song and not even in the same state as a hit song. I have had a few things both musically and lyrically that after they were gone I wish I had them back.

I think I have learned my lesson. I started doing something different this year. It is going slow but I am trying to stay determined. I started studying music theory again and going over things I have known for years that were not necessarily top of mind for me. I am trying to reconnect with things to come up with some more complex progressions and lyrics. I spent some money and bought some more material recently and that has kept me interested, so far. I am sure that I am going to get bogged down with building progressions but I am ready to start doing that. I am hoping that working some modal stuff into this will help get me to where I am finally happy with the results. One thing is for sure, I WILL NOT delete any thing going forward if I don't like it. I will save it and revisit it down the road and see if I can fix what I don't like.

I also have another thought in my head of how I am going to approach something I tried to start on here and will be revisiting that as well. My goal is to try to get some of me in musical format completed and released and get my playing enjoyment out of creating new music instead of staying up late on the weekends playing in bars to get enjoyment out of playing. I do love being on stage and watching people have fun with the music I am helping make and that will be missed. I am just not a big fan of the late nights anymore with having a day job.
Some great feedback already on the thread but did want to highlight one part here which is not to delete anything. That resonated with me. I have some stuff I wrote over a decade ago or a quick riff in my daw that never really went anywhere. Years later I’ll look back on it and catch some stuff I thought actually sounded good. Getting time away from what I write kind of allows me to hear it as a listener instead of my head playing along with what I know is coming next.

Wishing you all the best in your goals, Jason!
 
I've gotten back into writing this year after many years of being idle. (You know how life gets in the way!). Safe to say I'm a bit rusty!

The hard part for me is lyrics. If I can hit upon the right idea, the words come right out. But trying to find that right idea can be very daunting.

How do you guys get around this? Take my most recent song for example. I've come up with words but it's just not right. I find I'm struggling with the idea. Tells me it's not the right idea and I should probably go back and re-think the whole thing.

Last week I watched an interview with John Mayer about song writing. He said "coming up with music is easy. Coming up with words is harder and coming up with words that fit the music is very difficult." I'm not comparing myself to him in anyway, but I couldn't agree more with this. He said there are many, many songs he threw out because he couldn't conclude the story to his liking.

My motivation for trying to write is only to be able to say "cool, wrote another one! What's next?" I'm under no illusions of anything.

Suggestions?
 
I've gotten back into writing this year after many years of being idle. (You know how life gets in the way!). Safe to say I'm a bit rusty!

The hard part for me is lyrics. If I can hit upon the right idea, the words come right out. But trying to find that right idea can be very daunting.

How do you guys get around this? Take my most recent song for example. I've come up with words but it's just not right. I find I'm struggling with the idea. Tells me it's not the right idea and I should probably go back and re-think the whole thing.

Last week I watched an interview with John Mayer about song writing. He said "coming up with music is easy. Coming up with words is harder and coming up with words that fit the music is very difficult." I'm not comparing myself to him in anyway, but I couldn't agree more with this. He said there are many, many songs he threw out because he couldn't conclude the story to his liking.

My motivation for trying to write is only to be able to say "cool, wrote another one! What's next?" I'm under no illusions of anything.

Suggestions?
Congrats on writing more music! Lyrics can definitely be daunting at times. What I’ve found works for me consistently is identifying the story I’m telling as early in the songwriting phase as possible. Once I have two guitar parts (like a verse/chorus, intro/verse) whatever I usually pause writing. I’ll record it on my phone or DAW and listen back to it multiple times. I’ll ask myself does this move me? Is there a story worth telling here that’s emotionally resonant or has something to say?

Usually what happens in this stage for me is not words but mental images almost like a score playing over a movie in my head. From there I usually write out a poem that’s not dependent on melody or restricted to a certain meter. This is just to figure out how the song is usually going to develop. Do I want the bridge to change key or dynamics? If music is tension and release then I try to identify where those shifting points will happen in the context of a story. Once all the music is completed I work on vocal melodies. From there the poem becomes the base of the lyrics.

Sometimes things fit and sometimes they don’t. But at least I’m trying to figure out a different way to convey the message of whatever that particular written line is versus trying to figure out what I want to say. I’d agree with John Mayer that sometimes I don’t develop some songs but for me it’s because I identify early on that the music I’m writing isn’t bad but just doesn’t have much to say or is speaking to an emotion or situation I’ve already written about. I always save those phone videos or daw sessions because you never know if that riff or whatever will inspire or fit something better in the future. Sometimes I’ve written riffs that I tried to work as a verse but months later will end up as the perfect bridge for a different song. I view music as the ultimate story telling vehicle so this process works for me as I wrote short stories and poems a lot in my younger years.
 
Congrats on writing more music! Lyrics can definitely be daunting at times. What I’ve found works for me consistently is identifying the story I’m telling as early in the songwriting phase as possible. Once I have two guitar parts (like a verse/chorus, intro/verse) whatever I usually pause writing. I’ll record it on my phone or DAW and listen back to it multiple times. I’ll ask myself does this move me? Is there a story worth telling here that’s emotionally resonant or has something to say?

Usually what happens in this stage for me is not words but mental images almost like a score playing over a movie in my head. From there I usually write out a poem that’s not dependent on melody or restricted to a certain meter. This is just to figure out how the song is usually going to develop. Do I want the bridge to change key or dynamics? If music is tension and release then I try to identify where those shifting points will happen in the context of a story. Once all the music is completed I work on vocal melodies. From there the poem becomes the base of the lyrics.

Sometimes things fit and sometimes they don’t. But at least I’m trying to figure out a different way to convey the message of whatever that particular written line is versus trying to figure out what I want to say. I’d agree with John Mayer that sometimes I don’t develop some songs but for me it’s because I identify early on that the music I’m writing isn’t bad but just doesn’t have much to say or is speaking to an emotion or situation I’ve already written about. I always save those phone videos or daw sessions because you never know if that riff or whatever will inspire or fit something better in the future. Sometimes I’ve written riffs that I tried to work as a verse but months later will end up as the perfect bridge for a different song. I view music as the ultimate story telling vehicle so this process works for me as I wrote short stories and poems a lot in my younger years.
Good advice here and I thank you. Gave me something to think about.

One thing I have been doing lately is reading lyrics from some of the well known names in music. Some lyrics are very straight forward and some leave me completly puzzled as to what they are saying. Someone who's smarter than me could probably see right through it while I'm scratching my head! Noticed in some how there's very little rhyme. With some you know exactly what they are writing about, but they mask it in a very, very clever way, not saying exactly what they mean but yet you know what they're writing about. I find that fascinating.

One thing I do purely as a mental/writing exercise is: I'll come up with a phrase and see how many different ways I can say it. Sometimes it will be very straight forward and sometimes it will be a bit off the wall. It's actually kind of fun and it's good for this old brain of mine!!

Good luck to you!
 
Good advice here and I thank you. Gave me something to think about.

One thing I have been doing lately is reading lyrics from some of the well known names in music. Some lyrics are very straight forward and some leave me completly puzzled as to what they are saying. Someone who's smarter than me could probably see right through it while I'm scratching my head! Noticed in some how there's very little rhyme. With some you know exactly what they are writing about, but they mask it in a very, very clever way, not saying exactly what they mean but yet you know what they're writing about. I find that fascinating.

One thing I do purely as a mental/writing exercise is: I'll come up with a phrase and see how many different ways I can say it. Sometimes it will be very straight forward and sometimes it will be a bit off the wall. It's actually kind of fun and it's good for this old brain of mine!!

Good luck to you!
Im gonna try that exercise, thanks for sharing and the kind words! I’m definitely a fan of metaphors in lyrics or the whole song like Shape of My Heart by Sting. I would recommend checking out Volume II by Hurt. That album is stuffed with really clever lyrics with my favorites being the songs Et Al and Alone with the Sea. But I’m not too hot on esoteric lyrics where the meaning is too obscured.
 
The Jeff Tweedy book is useful, in that it gives you some tools. I don't think it does a great job of providing an overall songwriting process though. Now, if you are doing the thing, and you need a tool to get past an obstacle, that's when the book became useful to me.
 
Interesting thought from John Mayer:

"Writers block is when the two people inside of you--the writer and the reader--when the reader doesn't love the writer. Or when the listener
doesn't love the player. And so writers block is not a failure to write. Writers block is a failure to catch this feedback loop of enjoying what you're
seeing and wanting to contribute more to it."

"So writers block for me doesn't happen as often as it does for other people because I know when I'm ready to sit down and go for it."


But he also talks about his failures. In an interview (at that particuplar time) he talked about how he just threw 8 songs out because he couldn't conclude the stories in a way that wrapped it up for him. I love how he put it:

"I took the listener for a ride then I threw them out of the car before we got to Disneyland!"
 
Interesting thought from John Mayer:

"Writers block is when the two people inside of you--the writer and the reader--when the reader doesn't love the writer. Or when the listener
doesn't love the player. And so writers block is not a failure to write. Writers block is a failure to catch this feedback loop of enjoying what you're
seeing and wanting to contribute more to it."

"So writers block for me doesn't happen as often as it does for other people because I know when I'm ready to sit down and go for it."


But he also talks about his failures. In an interview (at that particuplar time) he talked about how he just threw 8 songs out because he couldn't conclude the stories in a way that wrapped it up for him. I love how he put it:

"I took the listener for a ride then I threw them out of the car before we got to Disneyland!"
Jennifer Aniston And The Others Have Never Been The Same Since...
 
-Walk away
-Change tuning
-Change instrument(having a cheap bass, keys, anything can be helpful)

Don’t delete anything. Ever. I’ve occasionally gone back and listened to years old riff and it struck me how well it fit with a current song. Doesn’t happen a ton, but ya never know. Storage is cheap.
 
I just go down this list ‘till the blockage clears:

- Go for a long ride on my Triumph
- Spend the day in my shop building something
- Spend the day hiking in the woods
- Take our dog on a trip into town
- Yard work
- Grab a good book and spend a few days “elsewhere”

Really anything that requires my attention/ concentration and gets me out of the house.
 
Keep a small notepad handy , Inspiration hits at odd times .. jot down that moment .. even if just a one line thought ..
Same with the instrument side , if you are noodling around and come up with something .. HIT RECORD.

I like Mayer's perspective, for me Lyrics always just flow .. If I sit down to write it comes out , a lifetime as a poet helps.

Sonically , I'm blessed to be involved with live music 3 nights a week so there is constant inspiration, at home I'l just program a nice groove on my little Boss acoustic drum machine , grab an instrument ( guitar, bass, conga) and just play until I get tired. It's fun to see what comes out , keep the "tape rolling " you never know when some gem will pop up..
 
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