Music is/should be an Impulsion

One thing, that I now feel inspired to write about, is something that has cropped up time and time again over the last few months…. Music Writing.

To be more specific.. why and when we as musicians write music. I mean (and this is not knocking anyones style. it takes all types) when i hear musicians i know say that they haven’t written a song for 6 months but ‘have to soon, because we want an EP out for the new year’, i kind-of do vomit in my own mouth a little. That statement isn’t just one musician i know; it’s probably around 50% of all the Musicians i know. 

I’m from the complete other side. Scope out my Myspace Blogs from 2006/2007 onwards and i have a tendency to mention how I’m not recording music to ‘be famous’. I write my music to document my life, and i always have done. When I finish a song, i don’t estrange myself from it because it doesn’t have ‘sell-ability’. In my opinion, this is how music started, and i’m a bit sad that this rationale has been lost, in favour of getting together to force-write songs because of commerce. However, commerce alone is completely fine, i just can’t subscribe to musicians getting together in order to create commerce, especially those who maintain that music is their passion.

One of the reasons I slipped into poetry-writing was how instantaneous I could get those opinions/feelings onto paper and document them. I know from the sales figures that not many folks like my/like poetry, but none of that matters to me, I’M documenting my feelings down, and because i am me, that’s the only thing that matters.

As a musician, specifically one who writes a lot of stuff (read: good, bad and terrible), it’s really amazing to look back on something 5+ years old and have a lyric remind you of a time, a place and a person. Take last week for example, i was cleaning out my closets and found lots of old school jotters (that i stole) full of songs that i hadn’t seen in easily 8+ years. I pulled out my acoustic and went through every single one. Between trying to remember, and actually being nostalgic; i think i sat for around 6 hours playing ancient songs. However, one song ‘Angel with Glitter Wings’ just took me back. It was written about a girl (who would become one of my best girlfriends of all time) that i randomly met on halloween night, who had glittery wings. Simple. The song is far from even average, but it’s nice, and had i not been into documenting experiences and feelings so much, i can honestly say i’d have NEVER remembered what she wore when i first met her, such is my terrible memory.

The point I’m trying to make is ; I find it a horrible shame that musicians are only writing for the sake of writing. Writing to create product. It’s a worldwide epidemic, and not limited to NI, but it’s tragic. There’s such a drive these days for musicians to spend 1 hour writing and recording a song, then 3,595 hours promoting it, but what is the point, really? This is not a mere statement of trying to appear the epitome of prolific, because if i released every song i wrote, I’d have 100 albums, and i know certain folks who are the same (Glenn from Intermission, Furlo, Fighting with Wire), it’s about writing for writing sakes… otherwise you’re painting a wall in the hopes of selling a building.