David Morris
Participant
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Thought I’d start a co-writing thread. Maybe Eric can move Shawn and Cliff’s comments about co-writing from Words or Melody here.
I’ve become a big fan of co-writing, in part because four of the last five songs I’ve worked on have been joint efforts, and two have been cut and two are on hold to be cut next year.
One of my co-conspirators, Chris Dockins, is a member of this group so I hope he weighs in. I found that writing with Chris helped remove some stumbling blocks that kept me from finishing an idea that I had. And I think I got him over the hump the same way with one or two his great hooks.
The other thing I find is that a writing partner gets me out of my comfort zone. I never would have written lyrics to “The Tenth Day of September” if John Miller hadn’t picked up the phone one day and said, “Hey, let’s write a song about September 11th.”
What are your experiences, folks?
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Cliff Abbott
Participant
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Well, I’m GONNA cowrite something with David Morris, someday, whenever, YMMV…
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Shawn Cramer
Participant
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Dave good move on your part to start this thread. I had gotten off topic in the other one.
Cliff, The story as it was related to me by my friend goes like this: Joe (my friend) was in Nashville self producing an album. He had hired some pretty well known session musicians for his project. A couple of the session guys liked what they heard and offered to help Joe by setting up a meeting with some recording execs. In the meeting, Joe was told he needed to lose 30 lbs. and that they were not even going to ask his age because he “looked young enough”. They went on to tell Joe that if they signed him they would hook him up with some other song writers because “the days of the individual songwriter were dead.” I use quotation marks pretty liberally here as I was not in the meeting to hear what was actually said, but what I have stated is a fairly accurate representation of the context of the story as it was related to me. Joe and I have been friends since before either one of us could drive and I have no reason to doubt what he told me. He has been making a full time living playing music for about 20 years and is one of those guys that has been kicking at the door of making it “big time” for quite awhile. He was pretty disappointed with the meeting to say the least. And I was quite surprised by some of the comments because of all the great song writers that have written songs by themselves historically.
I know when you read the liner info on country albums these days, very few songs are listed that weren’t co-written. It is an interesting trend, but surprising that it sounds like these execs at least don’t even want to consider individually written songs. To me a great song is a great song no matter how many authors there might have been.
Shawn
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Cliff Abbott
Participant
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It seems to me the “execs” were wanting assurance that they could choose the songs your friend would record rather than be stuck promoting whatever he wrote himself. In a world where image counts more than talent, and marketability mean more than plain old ability, the “lose 30 lbs” request makes perfect sense!
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Shawn Cramer
Participant
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I think you are spot on Cliff. I wasn’t suprised at the losing weight request either. I hate to sound like an old fogie, but MTV was one of the worst things that ever happened to music. Now it doesn’t matter how well you sing, if you don’t look pretty enough for vidoes, you don’t stand a chance.
It seems to me though that in my friend’s case a simple contractual clause would have been sufficient to give the execs some reassurance as to song selection.
Shawn
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Eric Tapp
Keymaster
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#47403 @davidm
Maybe Eric can move Shawn and Cliff’s comments about co-writing from Words or Melody here.
I’ll see what I can do about that David.
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Max Gainey
Participant
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Hey David, so do you and Chris sit down with your guitars and knock it back and forth or is this done with phone, email, and mp3′s? Can you (or anyone else) talk a little about the “nuts and bolts” of the writing process? Great subject, thanks.
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David Morris
Participant
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Max, Chris and I are both in the Washington DC area, so we’re able towork things out in my music room, and then trade digital files to finish up. With John Miller, we sometimes work together and sometimes work remotely because we’re four hours apart. In that collaboration, I’m usually the words guy and John’s the melody master. We trade a lot of files.
I was recently invited to write with a New England songwriter via Skype. I’ve never done that before, but I’m looking forward to trying it. Cliff Abbott and I, on the other hand, are going to meet somewhere for our first co-write. So it’s whatever the participants are comfortable with.
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Cliff Abbott
Participant
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We’ll need to wait until you can get the election noise out of your head so you’re free to write!
Nice to see you here, Max!
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Shawn Cramer
Participant
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Cliff,
Maybe you can use that “election noise” that Dave undoubtedly has in his head to write a politically motivated song? I would recommend a humorous song personally. With all the mud slinging that has become a part of our political process, some stress relief in the form of humor would be a welcome change of pace.
Good Luck my Friends
Shawn
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David Morris
Participant
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Well, Shawn, we’re always told to write what we know! But since I write about this political mess to pay the bills, I’m not so sure I want o tackle it in song as well. But, yeah, it would have to be a funny one because a song called “Both Sides Are Full of Crap And Should Be Forced To Listen To Lite Jazz” probably won’t get too far.
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Shawn Cramer
Participant
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Dave, that sounds like a song I would not only buy, but would make sure to learn to add to my repretoire.
Shawn
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Ivor Trueman
Participant
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‘Lite Jazz’ kinda rhymes with ‘Blue Grass’…
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Cliff Abbott
Participant
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Jack Clement wrote “The One on the Right is on the Left”, and Johnny Cash recorded it in 1965 on his “Everybody Loves a Nut” album. I’d be hard-pressed to ever top that!
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Shawn Cramer
Participant
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You are spot on about that Cliff. That song is hilarious and poignant at the same time.
Shawn
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