When Everybody Loves You
You Can Never Be Lonely
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Something that interests me is the writing process for fellow musicians. I’m especially fascinated by how vocalists form their ideas into a finished song. Because it interests me, I thought it might be cool for me to sort of layout my process for writing lyrics in Perfect People—my newest hardcore project. Over the course of, well, however long it takes, I’m going to outline and explain how I write songs. I hope people reading this find it insightful, but I might also be pretending I’m more important than I actually am. All jokes aside, I hope you enjoy my writing process.
Above is an image from one of my notebooks. When I begin writing a song, I have to warm up my brain a bit. Otherwise, I’m likely to write something awful that I am totally unhappy with. So a bit of a brainstorming is required before I can actually write any actual lyrics.
I usually begin writing what I’m feeling at the time. I have a lot of thoughts in my head, so this can be somewhat chaotic; a lot of times, I begin with one sentiment and end with another, totally opposite thought, but that’s okay. It’s all part of writing. What’s important, though, is that I’ve taken some time to organize and record my thoughts and feelings before the moment has passed. My lyrics can be inspired by anything and at any time. Sometimes, I’ll have a random thought cross my mind, and I’ll think it will make a good subject for a song, so I type it into the notes on my cell phone. Other times, I’ll just start completely cold and begin writing with no clear idea or theme in mind. This particular time, the song was inspired by something that has been bothering me lately—a simple belief that many people with whom I interact all seem to share that I don’t.
Because this phase is simple free writing and brainstorming, everything is cluttered, but I also have the freedom to say literally whatever I want. From this point, I can take out phrases, lines, sentences, and other devices such as alliteration, similes and metaphors, etc. that I’d like to use in the finished lyrics. Sometimes, the final song is only related to this phase in theme, and other times it’s merely a more organized and structured form of what I’ve written in the beginning paragraph(s).
Next entry, I’ll (hopefully) show you how what you see above starts to shape itself into a finished set of Perfect People lyrics.
(In case you can’t read it, I’m including the text from the notebook in quotes below. This will help to see how it all morphs from random, fleeting ideas into structured, rhythmic lyrics.)
“There’s no such thing as destiny, no such this as forever. I really wish you could hear how oblivious and stupid you sound when you claim that the simple, mundane occurrences that comprise your life are, ‘meant to be.’ The sad truth is, we’re all accidents—the unplanned birth from a broken cosmic condom, the bastards who slipped through the universe’s cracks. We’re the orphaned kids given away by our Father, forgotten and left to either die in the orphanage or be pawned off on someone who pities us. I’ve been waiting to be adopted my whole life. But no more waiting around for me.”
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Writing Process pt. 2
In the last post, I described the means by which the concept of one of my songs is written. Here, I’m going to (hopefully) better illustrate how that concept will turn into lyrics.
Travis, Perfect People’s drummer, does the majority of the writing for the band. When he has a finished song, he records all the parts together on a 4-track console and emails the rough track to everyone in the band. I listen to the songs to get ideas, but that’s usually all I manage to do at this point. I don’t start putting lyrics to specific tracks until later.
I start adapting the paragraphs from my free writing into lines and phrases that best illustrate the point I’m trying to make with the song. In hardcore, I feel that if you’re saying words without saying anything, the song shouldn’t be written. Additionally, I am very much influenced by my favorite authors as well as my favorite singers, and I believe it was Alan Moore who once said that if your words aren’t progressing the story (in this case, the point or concept), then they’re unnecessary. That’s the approach I take to writing, whether it be lyrics or prose. I very rarely repeat myself—in fact, I avoid choruses all together—unless the song feels like it needs something repeated.
Eventually, I’ll have a set of lyrics with which I’m happy. It’s at this point that I’ll start trying to put the first draft of the words to the music. Sometimes things need to be rearranged and/or altered, or I’ll need to add something to make the lyrics fit the song. This becomes a sub process all its own, and I incorporate thesauruses, dictionaries, and other reference materials if necessary.
That’s about it for the second part. Next time, I’ll explain how the first draft is molded into the beginning stages of the final product.
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Writing Process pt. 3
The lyrics have essentially been written in their “skeleton” form—meaning, I’ve gotten the basics on paper, but nothing is concrete because the “meat” (to continue the anatomical analogy) hasn’t been added quite yet. This when it all starts to take shape.
If I’m working on the lyrics for a band practice, this part of the process will take place with the rest of the band present. If not, I usually work everything out with a recording of the music. With this particular example, I did a little of both. Once I had gotten everything written, I had a bit more to add and felt it would be best to let the lyrics evolve a bit more organically, writing alongside the members of the band while they performed the music for me.
Much of what I wrote in that first post was kept in the final version of the song. When I needed to add something, I did so in a way that kept the original themes and motifs concurrent with the new lines. There are some songs that can flourish with the addendum of seemingly random, fleeting thoughts, but this certainly was not one of them. I wanted everything to represent the, for lack of a better term, “thesis” of the lyrics: There is no such thing as destiny. This line repeats throughout, and I think it’s fitting that everything relates back.
Now that the song has been placed to music, the “bugs” have to be ironed out before the whole process comes to a close. This is done at practice, and it isn’t exactly something that can be described verbally.
St. Louis. Geek. Straight Edge.
