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Occasional songwriting tip or blog musing.

Never apologize from your Ivory tower

Back when ads for cigarettes were portrayed as good for you as home cookin’…

Cars had more rounded, less aerodyne features…

Long before the cell phone was even a brain fart…

And a PC was an abbreviation for “piece.”

There was one product which was put on the map because of one thing that made them 100% different than its competitors.

Yes, there is a songwriting principle coming so HANG ON to your undies.

The product?

Ivory soap.

What made it different?

It was the only bar soap that floated.

So big deal. You didn’t have to plunge the depths of the bath water to find it.

It bobbed the high seas of your bath water patiently waiting to be scrubbed over your dirty little self.

So what?

Here’s the thing.

It was unique.

It was innovative.

It was original.

And it made NO APOLOGY for being different.

In fact, it exploited its difference.

It wasn’t trying to be a copy of the top bar at the time.

Here’s the thing.

In all the songwriting quote, unquote, rules. It might not hurt to see what makes your songwriting bar float.

What makes your writing different than others.

Stop trying to copy someone else’s writing, BE ORIGINAL.

Get this one.

You might think I’m bullcrapping you, I sooooooo am not.

There are companies who charge tens of thousands of dollars for business people to learn how to be “authentic.”

Are you kidding me?

Pay huge money to learn to be myself?

SCREW THAT!

Our society has morphed into pleasing others so much, it’s lost how to be itself.

While it’s good to learn what makes listener’s appreciate and love a song, I don’t know about you, but sometimes it just gets hard to find something we haven’t heard a copy of before. Something original.

Thus lies the challenge of the songwriter, write something which is familiar enough to a listener but different enough to be interesting.

The best way I know to do that, is to be yourself, because no one else is you.

And above all, never apologize for floating in your Ivory tower of who you are.

We can learn, we can improve, we can change, but we are who we are, and let’s work with that.

Okay?

That’s it.

Until next time… keep writing from the heart.

Oh, and get your copy of June’s Tune Booster wile you still can. It’s at: https://www.tunesmithtips.com/newsletter/

Stephen King does this in private

Ever read any of Stephen King’s books?

Yes, this has to do with songwriting.

I’m not big on horror.

But I love a good mystery.

I love to be toyed with.

Some tension to keep me in the game.

Mr. King, in the privacy of his home there in Maine does this every single day.

First of all. He writes, every day.

But more than that, he knows the art of writing in such a way; it toys with your sense of expectation.

Your sense of fulfillment or tension and release.

Boy, if you want a good book, which isn’t horror at all.

Go get: 11-22-63.

Not many books I can’t put down, but if I could have, I’d have stayed up the entire 30-hours to listen to the audio book.

It was the incredible attraction of tension, and release.

The expectation candy.

That’s what makes his books so much different than so many writers.

And, that’s what can help make you a different songwriter than others.

Build in an expectation, or toy with the ear.

And one way that is done is through how words are placed in a verse…

How they play out in the mouth…

The ear…

The dance they do around the beat of a song.

Think its just happenstance some songs are better than others?

Think it’s just a good story or melody?

Hopefully not, or the road to good writing ended for you long ago.

You’ll look at some examples in June’s Tune Booster.

Plus, word stress problems even hit- writers fall prey to.

But you won’t…

Not if you follow my six fixes.

Find out more here.

Bold-faced songwriting lie… bullcrap even

I’m a long-time M*A*S*H fan.

My daughter and I sometimes get on these, who said what, trivia kicks.

Each trying to catch out the other in a “gotcha” moment.

I always win of course.

All right. Maybe she does.

I remember one quote from Hawkeye when asked if he volunteered for duty in the war.

He said, “Are you kidding? I was under the front porch with an ice pick in my hand trying to puncture an eardrum when they came to get me.”

I guess he wasn’t too inspired to serve his duty in the war.

Ever get like that with writing?

Lack inspiration, that is.

Maybe your ear drum is your inspiration.

And it’s not an ice pick aimed at it, but…

You’re tired.

Don’t have anything to write about.

Just don’t feel like writing.

Have to feel the creativity flow first.

Dog needs walking.

Got to get up early tomorrow.

Guitar is out of tune and its way over there.

Not being channeled to write right now.

Boss yelled at me and it’s bothering me.

Yada-yada-yada.

A cartoon friend of mine does something every time he sits down to draw.

It’s a little thing that stabs his inspiration blocker right through the heart…

And he’s got a whole jar of these things sitting on his shelf.

I’ll tell you about how he kills the inspiration zombie in July’s Tune Booster.

I’ve got a similar trick for songwriters.

We’ll expose some things which prevented me from being inspired when sitting down to write.

We’ll even give permission to not write at times.

Plus, how some writers you may have heard of before are inspired.

A whole deal on inspiration and keeping the zombies away.

In fact, writer’s block is a bunch of bullcrap. I don’t care who says it’s real, it ain’t and we’ll prove it.

We’ll even find out what Chuck Schultz, the creator of Peanuts, had to say about writer’s block.

For now though. Get June’s Tune Booster while it’s still up.

Coming down shortly.

If you join in July, there’s no June issue to be had there.

Just sayin’.

Get it while there’s still time.

Bumpin’ beauties with your songwriting

Yesterday, my wife and I walked into this place and got chatting with a dude working there.

He was telling us about and old couple who walked in cradling a baby.

Only, it wasn’t’ a baby.

It was a DOLL!

They said it was a baby, but-it t’weren’t no baby.

Another lady who worked there peaked in and said, “Oh, I thought you had a real baby there.”

Both geezers said, “It is a REAL baby.”

And they were as serious as a heart-attack this was a real baby.

Okay. I’ve heard of these human-like baby dolls they had teenagers take home and care for.

But this.

These were two seniors.

Not teenagers learning the responsibilities of bumping uglies and there’s a brand new meaning to, “Happy Father’s Day.”

The man we talked to even had pictures of the old couple coddling the doll…

They kind of creeped him out.

So, he snapped some pics just to be safe in case something weird happens to an innocent child, as he’s seen this pair around before.

Sadly, it was probably more a product of dementia than anything dangerous.

But, what’s the songwriting take away here?

Maybe you bumped uglies with your tunesmithing and your baby ain’t a baby at all.

Maybe your perspective is a little off?

Fake babies are dollies,

I’m not sure what you’d call a fake song.

Whatever it is, you don’t want to go around coochy-cooing its chin expecting smiles from everyone.

When it ain’t a living breathing song.

Get yourself ten different sources: pro writer, fellow songwriters, group feedback, audience, or anyone who will give an honest looksee.

Let them tell you if your tune is breathing or not.

Probably want to avoid fam.

Fam and friends have a hard time being objective.

Either way you can bump beauties with your songwriting and produce some cool tunes.

And Tune Booster helps you out.

Get June’s issue WHILE YOU CAN.

Until then… keep writing from the heart.