When writing songs, one can start with the tune or the words or, happy chance, both. If you start, as I tend to, with the words, you have to watch out for several traps. One is writing all the songs to the same rhythmic pattern (ah, our first principle -- rhythm -- is central, isn't it?). I used to compose lyrics on the subway ride to my office. And I noticed, after awhile, that I had several lyrics that would all sing to the same couple of tunes. I had to make myself try different patterns, fairly arbitrarily, to break the habit. Lots of those lyrics never became finished songs, either.

Then again, writing tunes can have snags, too. I find that if I'm noodling on guitar or banjo, a tune fragment will come to me. Then I try to repeat it, to "get it down" (i.e., remember it longer than one repetition). But my conscious mind starts to look for origins -- "what existing tune does this sound like?" Bang! Now I'm playing that existing tune, and my new masterpiece has gone to that organic bit-bucket in the sky. So the only way to break that pattern is to NOT think "What does this sound like?" but instead play it till it sticks. Then you can have your friends tell you, "Hey! I didn't know you played any Joanie Mitchell!" and then start over.

When the tune comes with its own words, when you start humming or picking and a lyric line flows with it, that's the special time, that's the "song is writing you" moment. And it's rare. It may be genius (which is why it's rarer with me than some others), it may be fate, it may be cosmic influence, it may be a toothpaste commercial. But those are the ones that often end up being the best ones. Or at least the start of the best ones -- you still have to rewrite, revise, and sing to check on singability. Too many writers never really check on the singability of their words, so we get the emPHAsis on the wrong sylLABle and high held notes on bilabial fricative consonants and so forth. Alas, many, many, many, (far too many) songer-singwriters seem to think that the first words out of their mouths are gold, and that tinkering with them is a travesty. Wrong.

That's my tuppence.

But if it's not got a good beat, easy to dance to, it doesn't deserve a 70. Remember that.

Bob