d.b.a. Songwriters: Who’s Ready To Work?

I got an e-mail from one of my clients today who’s sent me tons of songs to review. I’d never sent her a review stating one of her songs was ready to demo. This is a woman who actually quit writing after one review I sent her nearly a year ago. (Yep, that’s my goal…to discourage and frustrate songwriters around the world!)

To say the least I was horrified. I suggested she give it another shot. Thank goodness she was open to suggestions. Last week she sent me the best song she’d ever sent me. This was her reply to my critique:

OMG…do you have any clue what that evaluation meant to me? I was so happy that stupid me cried (not alot..but it brought tears to my eyes). [As a mentor] you gave me a good chewing out when I deserved it..and also gave me some good comments, when you saw some potential. I have been writing my butt off…but all [in one genre]…but yesterday I said to myself…you know how to write a [that genre of] song…now it’s time to write a real song…you were right about it sounding like it just came to me without any struggle at all!!! After I wrote the [the first phrase] the rest just fell into place!

Notice the four-line phrase somewhere in the middle of all this: ” I have been writing my butt off.” Let me back up a little.

I’m a guitar player. I started playing guitar in college. I became obsessed with it. I hadn’t ever been “really good” at anything and I felt pretty insecure about that. I practiced about six hours a day. It came easy to me and I learned fast. That was the fun part… for once I seemed to have some natural ability at something. By the end of the first year I could actually “play guitar.” But the end of the second year I was teaching beginners. And on it went…

Somewhere in there I started writing songs. I’d spend about an hour on the lyric to a song (if that much)… maybe more, usually less. The reason I started writing songs was because I was in a band and we didn’t know how to copy real songs off records. I solved that problem by announcing to the band that we’d be writing our own songs from now on. (I figured how hard could that be?)

By the time I’d written about 15 songs (three of which had been demoed) I thought I should be getting Top 40 airplay and began to seriously question the politics of the music business.

Some 20 or so years later I moved to Nashville. That was in 1996 and I now had 10 songs I’d written that I thought really were worthy of being cut…not like those first three demos. (ha ha ha… how could I have ever thought those songs would get cut!) No, now I was serious. My focus was on figuring out how I’d sort out the fights that would be taking place over who’d get to cut my songs.

Eleven years later: I wouldn’t play you any of those songs today, even if you begged me.

What I can’t figure out is why I, a rational, realistic human being, thought my songs should be getting airplay when I probably hadn’t spent more than about 125 to 150 hours writing all the songs I’d ever written in my life. People, I spent more time than that in the first month learning to play guitar. But with my songwriting I didn’t think it should be all that much work. You figure out a lick on the guitar and you write something about your girlfriend, right? Isn’t that all there is to it?

What I have a hard time comprehending is how many hours the writers in Nashville spend working. They work at it like a full time job…40 (or more) hours a week. They’re intentional about it. They make appointments. They study lyrics. They practice their instruments. They work on their phrasing, their use of language, they jot things down, they go hear other writers, they borrow tricks that other writers use, they read the trades, they study the trends, they follow the industry, they meet the people, they hang out, they demo their songs, they think about it all the time, and…well…they work. And they work hard.

Someone told me you have to write about 200 songs before you start getting it. That really scared me when I moved to Nashville with ten songs. I didn’t want to hear that so I told myself I was different. Turned out I was right. It took me more than 200 songs to start getting it. But my love for music kept me here. I still haven’t gotten the big cut. But I’ve written a couple songs that they tell me really are in the game. I wish I could say I’ve written more than a couple. Don Schlitz said “I have to write bad so I can write good.” Well, I’ve got the first part down cold. I say that only partially joking. It really is part of the deal.

The amount of work that it’s taken me to get to the point where I could write a song that’s “in the game” has been staggering. I had no idea it would be this hard. I thought it was more about luck, knowing the right people, getting stuff in the back door, having an uncle who’s a producer, etc. etc.

But if you’d asked me if having or knowing any of those things would have helped my progress on the guitar I’d have simply rolled my eyes and said, ‘What, are you nuts?” Why is it I could be realistic about the guitar but not about songwriting? What is it about songwriting that makes us think we can just do it without working at it? We all fall prey to that at some point. We all think our first three songs are great. What makes normally objective rational people so blind to the reality of songwriting?

I thought that through my website maybe I could help other writers deal with their own reality, or lack thereof, in matters of the craft of songwriting. But the most frustrating thing for me as a song guy is that the majority of the clients that find me don’t really want my help or anyone else’s when it comes to their craft. I tell many they have songs with potential but they need work, and I make suggestions and recommendations. Most of those individuals simply send turn their backs and send their songs to someone else. They keep doing that until they find someone who thinks they’re great. Someone who doesn’t think their songs need work. Someone who will get them to “the people that matter”… for a price of course. They’re only too eager to write the check that will get their songs on the radio. These are the same people who six months later are flaming on some website about all the “rip off artists” in Nashville. I’ll admit it’s been hard to not simply take their money at times. I wish I could tell you I’m walking the moral high ground or some such nonsense, but the truth is I simply can’t work on bad songs for any amount of money.

Most people don’t think they need help. What they think they need is a shortcut. They need a name, a number, or an e-mail address of someone out there who will recognize their true genius. They think the hard part in all this is finding the contact info on that magic person, and getting them to stop what they’re doing for three minutes and 30 seconds (or in some cases five minutes and 40 seconds) to listen to a song from someone they’ve never heard of.

What they don’t know is that’s actually the easiest part of the process. The hard part is the other part….the part about the song.

Never have so many been so deceived about their level of progress than in the arena of songwriting, and present company definitely included. Why? I have absolutely no idea. Sorry if I wasted your time reading this article, but I have no answers. I do have some ideas. We know you can’t measure songwriting like you can measure a sprinter’s time in the 40 meter, or a high jumper’s highest jump, or a linebacker’s tackles per game. Even a guitar player can be ranked in regard to certain things such as speed and licks (“Dude, he can play Van Halen’s ‘Eruption’ note for note!”). What are you going to say about a song? “Dude he rewrote ‘Wind Beneath my Wings’ in ten minutes and it sounds exactly the same!”

I figure I spent about 2100 hours learning to play the guitar the first year I played. Why did I think learning to write songs would be any different?

I may not have answers to why we’re so easily deceived, but I do have two promises for you:

1. Work hard and it may actually happen.

2. If you don’t work hard it’ll never happen in a million years.

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Bill Renfrew has an extensive background in teaching songwriting and evaluating songs, and has years of professional experience consulting on songwriting and song rewriting, which he does through his website. He owns and operates Write THIS Music, an independent music publishing company, and Bombshelter Recording Studio, both of which are located in Nashville, TN. For more Renfrew, check out Writethismusic.com.