penningtron wrote: Mon Dec 20, 2021 8:20 am making yet another project on Reaper 5 people will hear' so maybe feeling a bit defeated in that sense.

Story of my entire musical career. A friend who just put out his first full release on Bandcamp asked me how you get people to actually go to Bandcamp to listen to it and my response was "Don't ask me, I have 10 records on my Bandcamp that YOU have never listened to dude!"

Good stuff on the thread. Mostly I feel better knowing it goes around. I found something that is working OK. Even though these songs are all guitar driven ideas, yesterday I just quickly and sloppily laid down guitar tracks in like one take, slightly edited the parts that would throw off playin along with it, and started writing synth parts. It was fun and I actually got some stuff accomplished. I'll go back and record the guitar well (as I can) later. Maybe I just don't like guitars anymore.

I love getting the "Your Month on Bandcamp" emails to reassure me that no one is listening to my lovingly-crafted art!

bishopdante wrote: Mon Dec 20, 2021 12:26 pm Well, free wheeling ramble is sustainable, but proper articulation involves emphasis on starting and stopping. Depends on the insect, but fast running and flying ones have to have a small middle. Pinching is more tricky than bloating.

One feature that makes a lot of sense is knowing how to warm up, and actually having a routine based on that.

In the most awful meat grinder / butlins / circus types of show business, there is a warm-up routine used to spin up the spectacle. Warming up is actually a question of getting the heart rate up and the blood going to the right areas of your brain.

It isn't advisable to assume you can go from zero to a hundred instantly. It's possible, but is the most difficult.

LOLZ what on earth are you on about? I suggested FM Kniferide simply strum some chords on their guitar.

But yes, one should certainly start out strumming at a nice comfortable tempo before moving into Ramones territory.

thank you Bishopdante for the thoughtful and valuable post(s)
ya'll need to reread it

scrotescape wrote: Mon Dec 20, 2021 6:50 pm thank you Bishopdante for the thoughtful and valuable post(s)
ya'll need to reread it

Never gonna happen.

A_Man_Who_Tries wrote: Mon Dec 20, 2021 1:53 pm I never have this problem, and I believe it's because I have a condition that knocks me out of commission when it so chooses. The idea of being able to do the work in a later slot isn't assured, so any workable slot is where shit gets done. Professionally or for pleasure.

Outside of that, just for creative methods' sake, I live by the following:

1) Knock something out. I write a scene a day before I start any work. Doesn't have to relate to anything in particular; purely an exercise (although some of these do get developed);

2) My knockabout music-related: Similarly, bash something out purely by gut. I give myself half-an-hour and stop there;

3) Maybe the best one for me, is to end the work on an ascent to something known. That way I can immediately get going at the start of the next session, because I know where things are going. Ending 'at an ending', if you like, always makes it a little tougher to get into gear the next day.

4) A little psilocybin.

3) is a good one. Hemingway said something similar. I'm not a fan of his, and this trick doesn't work for me, but it obviously will for some.

Also, I've enjoyed bishopdante's posts immensely, 'verbose, knotty, and incomprehensible' or not.

turnbullac wrote: Mon Dec 20, 2021 12:13 pm TBH I just cant write lyrics anymore at all.

SAME. Ooh/ahh vocals through a delay or whatever can be fun sometimes but 'writing a song about X' is a drag and the results always feel stupid, so I won't be doing it anymore.

I've had a lot of the same problems others have mentioned here, getting going being one of the big ones, and finishing things being another one.

For the last 10 years I've been doing a songwriters' circle with 2-5 other people. 3 of us have been there the whole time; other folks have come into and out of the group over the years. We meet every 3-4 weeks (virtually, now) and the goal is to always bring something, even if that thing is something you shat out that morning in a half hour, to share with everyone else.

Just being mildly accountable to other people has helped me shed some of that inertia toward inaction. Another benefit of it is that we all do very different kinds of music, so the constructive criticism you get can be a perspective you wouldn't normally see yourself. Some people do lyrics and sing, some don't.

Having a deadline has also helped me prioritize working faster and more decisively. Examples of that:
- having everything ready to start recording when I sit down to work on a song, with minimal fuss
- aggressively biasing toward printing tracks rather than trying to perfect them or shitting around with plugins etc.
- if a structure or narrative doesn't come naturally, I'll artificially superimpose one, start laying it out, and let any terrible results show me where I'd rather go instead

Another thing I've learned that was maybe implicitly mentioned by FM AMWT's #1 item: sometimes you just gotta write through the shitty ones. Get that satirical dick pill jingle out of your head so you can make room for stuff you care about.

penningtron wrote: Tue Dec 21, 2021 6:52 am

turnbullac wrote: Mon Dec 20, 2021 12:13 pm TBH I just cant write lyrics anymore at all.

SAME. Ooh/ahh vocals through a delay or whatever can be fun sometimes but 'writing a song about X' is a drag and the results always feel stupid, so I won't be doing it anymore.

This falls into the "Wife work" category for me. I simply have nothing to say in a song and hate writing/singing lyrics.

I love (and hate) writing lyrics, but it takes way longer than writing music. The practices for productivity with lyrics are a little different for me. Lots of phone memos, scraps of paper, dog eared pages of books. When I read less, writing lyrics gets harder. I like how it requires topical curiosity to keep producing.

The only thing that has *ever* consistently worked for me, in the way of inspiration and actually writing songs, is writing songs outside the company of a DAW or studio. I've never had luck trying to pull ideas out of nothing, it's always been something that's come to me when I'm doing something else, showering, getting ready for bed, whatever mindless activity it may be. You need to make it as easy as possible for yourself to be ready to capture those ideas as they come to you. Put an acoustic guitar in your bedroom, hum an idea into your phone. That way when you do have time to sit behind a DAW you have ideas that came from an inspired mind, rather than a frustrated one.