Joni Mitchell’s 1976 album Hejira has a mysterious magical quality to it. True, it sounds unmistakably “70’s,” but, aside from that, there’s this ghostly majesty to it. The lore behind Hejira is that it was mostly written on a cross-country car trip. The lyrics have a lonely, restless quality to them.

“Hejira” is an approximation of the Arabic word for “journey” (Hijra). The term originally referred to the prophet Muhammad’s travel from Mecca to Medina in 622. In a 1998 concert, Painting with Words and Music, Mitchell commented that “Hejira” has mostly a traveling context for her; and, that the word just looked cool.

Sometimes, I just fall into writing. I don’t understand the how and the why of it, but that’s usually how it happens. While watching my car get fixed, I wrote “October.” While sitting in a hotel room on Sunset Blvd, having all but given up on trying to finish writing the album that would become Dirty Wake, I wrote “Wonderland” on a Pollo Loco napkin. My best work is often unplanned.

Last week, my wife and I did a considerable amount of traveling. We left Greensboro on Friday, July 10 and drove to Bald Head Island for a wedding. From BHI, we drove to the Smokey Mountains for a week of vacationing with her parents, siblings, and our nephews and niece.

For me, vacationing has a restless quality. I enjoy many activities, outings, and departures while out on the road. It’s the downtime that I have difficulty with. I always feel like I should be doing something. Last Friday, while staring at the random patterns on the hotel ceiling, tired from a first venture to the island, I felt compelled to write in a Moleskine notebook. I wrote down the things I saw, the ideas I had, and the images that came to mind.

In a college poetry writing class, I learned of the importance of keeping an Aleph List. This imagery bank provides a jumping off point for when one actually sits down to right poetry or, in my case, lyrics for music. In this way, using images creates a “show don’t tell” aspect to lyrics that I crave. In a more personal sense, an Aleph List from a vacation can create a compelling alternative to a photo album or home movie.

A few days later, as the entries in my Aleph List grew, as did the experiences and memories from the trip, I began dumping my favorite images into my lyric notebook. Sometimes the images re-appeared as-is. Sometimes they were altered. Sometimes new ones were created from their reimagining. The images began to change. They took on meter and rhyme. “Oh, crap,” I thought. This vacation is turning into a writing trip.

I just happened to have a guitar, a mandolin, and a four-track recorder in my bag. I had intended to get caught up on recording my long overdue podcast. The lyrics inspired music, which inspired more lyrics.

Something about Joni’s guitar playing during the Hejira period inspired me to totally de-tune my guitar. As I approached each set of lyrics, I opted to transmogrify the pitch of the guitar for each song. Aside from making sure to catalog what I had tuned each song to, I have know idea how some of the tunings emerged. I recall a few that absolutely make no sense, but somehow, still work for the song. For me, that’s what being creative is all about.

As the days rolled on, so did the completed, demoed three-track recordings of new songs. I used only three tracks, starting with a main guitar track, then adding a vocal, then adding supporting mandolin. The result has been, for lack of a better term, quite interesting.

I am still trying to comprehend the prolific week. It has been a struggle to write with any degree of authenticity in the past year. Out of 22 or so new songs, I had only championed two or three. The others aren’t bad, but they certainly had been written before, certainly by me.

The Return of Spring is about 75% complete. I wonder if these new writings merit a new and separate recording. The chief proponent of working on these new songs is that they resemble a coherent work that comes from a singular source. The Return of Spring, while a grand undertaking in and of itself, is more or less a “best of” collection of unreleased songs. “Hey, Angel” didn’t fit the scope of Gravity Affects Me. “Two Shadows” was left over from the Candelabra Sessions. “Nightmares” was left off of The Lessons of Autumn because it was too lyrically similar to “October.” I have to wonder if the odds and sods quality of Spring is what’s holding back it’s completion.

The obvious drawback to working on these is that it obfuscates my already long laundry list of recordings-to-make. This isn’t at all what I want right now. Although, I have to wonder if maybe this is what I need.

In recent days, I’ve been told by very different people how much they like the song “November.” Unsolicited compliments like that have to make me wonder if I’m receiving a sign. These new songs all resemble “November” in that they are de-tuned, finger picked, generally pensive, and ineluctably dark.

I’ve been told that I’m a conscious person. I feel things intensely, and, sometimes before they happen. That old saying from Star Wars, “I’ve got a bad feeling about this,” is something I’ve grown to trust. I wonder if the outpouring of creativity last week was actually a grand distraction from what was really going on at home while I was away.

My relationship with fear has greatly improved over the past year. On one hand, I am completely able to accept the fact that all fear exists within the mind. It’s not real, but imagined stress. Most of that imagined stress is the focal point of mere possibilities, which are also not real. Improbabilities are not impossibilities. On a long enough time line, even the most improbable of events will occur absolutely.

That fear of mine, that while I’m out of town, my water heater will crack and drip water onto my studio floor, slowly building to a flow, slowly building to an uncontrollable gush, seems to have been an irrational fear. Sure, it could happen, but what are the odds?

Apparently, the odds were precisely 349 to 1. And, my number was up.

The wave of shock that came over me on Thursday night was immediately quelled by a wave of gratitude. I have neighbors that were thoughtful enough to call me and tell me that water was pouring out of the side of my house. Also, they were willing to let me walk them through the worst-case-scenario procedure I had outlined.

In the frenzy, it was difficult to discern exactly how bad the situation was. Sure, water was spilling out of the side of my house, but exactly what did that mean? Thankfully, I knew it meant either: a) my house was completely flooded, or b) that water had pooled under my water heater and that the catch pan and piping I installed last August was doing it’s job. Fate chose “b.”

All of the experts I had consulted had said that a catch pan would offset 90% of the damage of a serious water-heater failure. They were right. Aside from an exorbitant water bill, the cost of a few sheets of drywall, and a box fan, the cost of the damage was minimal.

Upon leaving Tennessee, I had one song that was unfinished, needing only a second verse. This experience helped round out the trip well. I got my second verse. I got a lot more than I bargained for. I left Greensboro last week with no intensions or expectations. What I got was a new collection of songs and the experience of having faced my greatest fear.

Perhaps the best way for me to express my gratitude is to share these writings with those who would care to listen. Or, perhaps just being grateful is enough.

“The only thing to do with good advice is pass it on. It is never any use to oneself.” – Oscar Wilde

A wealth of information is at our fingertips at every moment. For the aspiring and practicing singer/songwriter, a library’s worth of information, how-to’s, what to do’s, what not to do’s, and etceteras are instantly accessible. The Internet is a great thing.

Nearly all of us are self-taught. Since I started playing coffee shops at the age of 17, I’ve never come across a single songwriter who has a degree in songwriting and performing. Experience and the knowledge of others is our only teacher. Being so, I read a lot.

Time and time again, there are five books I access on a weekly basis. I recommend these indispensible tools to anyone who is serious about becoming a better songwriter and musician. Courtesy links to the corresponding page on Amazon.com are provided.

The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron

Creativity had been a mystery to me for many years. I knew I was able to write songs, but I could never predict when a “good” song would “arrive” in the midst of my ramblings. I loved writing songs, but I could never write when I wanted to, or, even worse, when I needed to. I was a slave to chance. It was frustrating.

After reading Julia Cameron’s masterpiece The Artist’s Way, I realized (and accepted) that I am a blocked creative. And, that there are certain daily activities that could help unblock that creativity. Her 12-week course is life changing. It certainly changed my life.

The weekly chapters, the daily “morning pages,” and the weekly “artist dates” serve to unblock the creative mind and re-focus creativity so that it flows freely from its source and to the page, the stage, or the canvas…whatever your medium.

I’ve completed this initial 12-week course and its sequel, Walking in This World, with a group of writers, poets, and painters at Greensboro’s The Sanctuary. The literature is even more powerful when experienced with a circle of other creative people.

If there’s one book I’d recommend to anyone, it’s this.

All You Need to Know about The Music Business by Donald Passman

Back in the late 90’s, when everyone with a pulse and a guitar was getting signed, I got caught in the storm. A friend of mine, Margaret White (who used to accompany me on violin), handed me a copy of the third edition of All You Need to Know…with an inscription, “Make sure you read this before you go to those meetings.”

The meetings, of course, were the record deal and publishing discussions. There were lots of them. The one book that helped me understand the perplexing zeitgeist of the late 90’s music industry was All You Need to Know…

Passman lays things out in layman’s terms. He explains the functional basis for a manager, agent, lawyer, record company, publishing company, and just about any other archetypical figure that comes into play in a musician’s career. His explanation of copyright is worth the modest price of the book.

If you’ve ever wanted to know how record contracts work, how to get a license for recording a “cover” song, or why belonging to a performing rights organization is a good idea, this book offers well-grounded explanations.

A seventh edition of All You Need to Know… will be released this fall. I foresee more information on the new digital trends, the creative commons, and the future of the music business.

Recording Tips for Engineers by Tim Crich

“But, Mike, I’m a songwriter, not a sound engineer. I don’t understand that stuff,” you say. I know. I’ve said the same thing, too.

In my experience as a novice singer/songwriter, the most frustrating thing about recording was having an inability to communicate what I wanted from a recordist, mixer, or mastering engineer. Not having a vocabulary to express where I wanted to go often resulted in an impasse.

Recording Tips for Engineers walks the reader through the key parts of a recording session. And, Crich does it in a humorous way. The read is enjoyable and invaluably informative.

He speaks intelligibly about topics that are of grave importance in a recording studio. Phase, equalization, compression, and general techniques are all spelled out.

One or two reads of this book won’t make you an immediate expert in the studio, but it will empower you to know if you are in good, competent company. By that, I mean you’ll know what common mic placements are for, say, a drum kit or piano, and you’ll know, rather quickly, if something isn’t quite right.

My favorite thing about this book is that he offers real starting points. Many audio engineering books are either overly complicated or whimsically vague. Recording isn’t rocket science. Crich explains what goes on in the studio in a way that anyone, even a singer/songwriter who is about to make her first demo recording, can understand.

Hal Leonard Method Jazz Guitar

While jazz techniques aren’t necessarily immediately helpful to the aspiring singer/songwriter, this book does an incredible job with visualizing chord theory.

Chords are a second kind of dictionary. Understanding the fundamentals of harmony is essential for developing depth.

Sometimes my ears get a head of my brain. I’ll hear a chord, or better yet, construct a chord on the guitar that I don’t understand. All I know is that I like it. I always learn something when I look up the chord on a chart, or, use the theory that this book teaches to assign a correct name to it.

Another powerful songwriting tool is chord substitution. Opting to write a valid substitution in a chord progression adds depth to a melody. I love changing out a sus4 for a dom7 when it’s right. This book offers the musical theory needed to bring a tonal variance to one’s compositions.

The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens

Exposure to great poetry is always inspiring. Stevens might not be a poet that speaks to you. He speaks to me.

As songwriters, we are both minstrels and wordsmiths. The wordy part is just as important as the music part. There’s no better way to turn off a promising crowd than by having stale lyrics. Give people something from your heart in a way that they haven’t heard before. Dig. No, really dig.

Stevens appeals to me because of his creativity with words, images, and scenes. He’s the season king. His use of seasonal imagery is what inspired my most successful song, “October,” and, by extension, just about everything I’ve done since then.

I hope this info is helpful. I consult each one of these books every week. They certainly help me.

Songwriting is best done as a daily practice. Or, one should write as frequently as possible. I once took a history class taught by a successful writer of historical fiction. He once joked "We're always writing." As I get further away from that class, it seems he wasn't joking.

Since September, I've been on a writing journey. Like any period of time in life, some days are better than others. Some songs are better than others. You gotta have bad songs to have good ones. All that stuff.

I hoped to have 30 songs finished by the end of the year. As of today, I've added 22 songs to a folder in my iTunes library. I'd say maybe 8 or 9 of them are ones that I like. The rest are either failed experiments or bad ideas. All of them are valuable to me for the perspective they've afforded.

For better or for worse, there have been a few essential items I've had with me everyday. These have helped keep the muse speaking, so to speak. I don't think these things would be necessarily helpful for everyone who reads this. These things have been helpful to me, though.

1. Yellow Legal Pads - I don't know what's up with these things, but I tend to write best when I have a yellow legal pad upon which to scratch out ideas. I tried switching to a note pad that had clouds on it. I didn't like that. I also tried a bound journal. That was a bit constricting. I like to be able to rip out the lyric sheet at the end of the day and either throw it away or put it in the file cabinet. I also use yellow legal paper to write my "morning pages," a process advocated by Julia Cameron in her masterpiece The Artist's Way. I recommend this book to anyone who wants to be more creative.

2. A Stereo Recorder - Ideas strike me differently. Often, I'll be sitting around without a guitar, or maybe (as in the picture above) playing a bass. Then, bam, I get a melody or idea for a song. A decent stereo recorder is great for putting down ideas. Even if you don't come back to it for a few days, weeks, or months, sometimes, things just aren't the same as you remember them.

3. A Variety of Instruments - Playing the same guitar, the same beat box, or the same scenario over and over lacks an element of surprise. Even if you only have access to one instrument (as of now, I only have one decent acoustic guitar), it's often a good idea to find a piano, a dulcimer, or a tuba--anything that will allow you to try out a melody from a different perspective. In college, I used to take a song idea to a piano in a practice room in between classes. Similarly, if you're brave enough, jamming on a new idea with a friend can open up new perspectives to a work-in-progress.

4. A Rhyming Dictionary - I get stuck looking for a word all the time. A rhyming dictionary helps introduce an idea that will rhyme. It never does well to depend on this for all of your end words, but having knowledge of every word that rhymes with a given word will help you avoid the obvious. I like to have at least the title of the song and most of a chorus mapped out before consulting a rhyming dictionary.

5. An Avatar - I like to have an inanimate object in my corner. Murray, the artist's mannequin, is by my side for every song. Having a symbol of your artistic self placed in a prominent place in your creative space does wonders. He's even come to life for me, in some ways.

Only eight more to go...Whew. Not so bad. I'll be playing a set of all new material at my acoustic set at Deep South on December 21st. Also, a new demo recording will appear on every new podcast.

Please excuse the tardiness and non-activity of my blog. The marathon just about killed me this time. I'm retiring from endurance sports. That said, the blog is back.

I mentioned on my podcast that I was doing a lot of writing now-a-days. Upon my completion of the studio, I decided to launch into one last writing period before picking up work on the next solo record(s). The latest problem with recording The Return of Spring is that, while the songs are very new to my listeners, most of them have been around for years. I'm taking one last stroll down the tryptic; one last perusal of the flowers before jumping into the inevitable.

The writing period will end when I've finished thirty songs. I know that sounds like a lot, but I'm already twenty songs into the process. I'm doing really rough four-track demos of the songs as soon as they are complete. There's not a lot of thought put into the production/archival recordings of these things. Just set it and forget it. Everything is one take. I'll be sharing a song from these sessions on each new podcast.

The way I've been keeping the muse alive is by embracing unfamiliarity. Rather than pick up a guitar and lock myself in a room until I have a song, I'm trying something a little more fun. I'll try to use, as much as possible, instruments, sounds, patches, and/or samples, that are unfamiliar to me. This past week, for example, I wrote songs only on a mandolin. The week before that, I wrote only on a Wurly. I play neither a mandolin or a Wurlitzer with much frequency. So, the things I was "pulling down" seemed, if for a brief moment, new and unfamiliar. This is great for my artist brain. We had a good time with these tactics. All of us.

Is the material any good? I don't know. I'm more concerned about what I have to say and the way I say it rather than affirming it. Some of it falls short of an arbitrary mark, but a lot of it is really fresh. Most of the people I've played it for can't tell the difference between it and any of my previous stuff. I guess that's a good thing.

Stay tuned. More to come.

Thoughts on criticism, 4-tracking, and song craft. Read More...