Writing

Ok: go here (Pixie Carnation's MySpace)
start the song Little Sister now
read the post.








Aight. Yesterday me and Yotam had a quick chat about why we don't do a lot of writing:

me: ha
true
i gota start writing
i give up to quickly
same with writing music
im just really lazy and unmotivated
it's crazy
Yotam: yah man ive been thinking a lot of that
using it [eliotwinder.blogspot.com] to write
i dont care enough to write about anything
or maybe scared
to be opinionated

I was thinking about this in the car this morning on the way to work. While I was speaking in (at least partial) jest, Yotam's three lines (how much does that line break after scared do for this statement?) pretty much summed it up. I often sit down to write, and find that I don't really have anything that I feel is interesting enough to commit to paper. Case in point: yesterday I read this article by Kimberley K. McLeod (via Smoking Gun), which is definitely worth a read. It explores the recent theme in rap music:

"It’s your typical hip-hop and R&B video. Scantily clad women. An outdoor pool. Champagne bottles. Lesbians. Yes, lesbians. These women may not be your typical idea of a music video cameo, but it’s becoming more common for male R&B and hip-hop artists to sing and rap about discovering their girlfriends with other women."

I came up with a clever concept for a track. I'm gonna write a rap song in which the protagonist (the rapper/me) walked in on his girlfriend cheating. At first, I'm all about it. Lesbians! That's hot, right? That's verse 1. As the song progresses (verse 2) as does my gf's lesbian relationship, I can no longer ignore the idea that the two may have something more than the physical relationship depicted by most rappers. In McLeod's words: "That is exactly where these artists draw the line. There is never any mention of the two women actually loving one another or having a sexual relationship that is mutually satisfying."
Third verse, in the manner of George Jones, I'm nursing a bottle of Jack lamenting the stupidity of my initial reaction.

Fucking brilliant, right?!

So I make a quick beat on hobknox.com and sit down to write

...Nothing...

I came up with a couple of pretty weak lines. Thankfully, I deleted them, so they are not posted here. For a taste, the first two lines were something like this:

(in License to be Ill period Beastie boys timbre and meter):
Cruisin down Broadway on a Friday night,
Just me and my lambo and my girl to the right.

Introduce the characters, right?

. . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . ,.-‘”. . . . . . . . . .``~.,
. . . . . . . .. . . . . .,.-”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .“-.,
. . . . .. . . . . . ..,/. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ”:,
. . . . . . . .. .,?. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .\,
. . . . . . . . . /. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ,}
. . . . . . . . ./. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ,:`^`.}
. . . . . . . ./. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ,:”. . . ./
. . . . . . .?. . . __. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . :`. . . ./
. . . . . . . /__.(. . .“~-,_. . . . . . . . . . . . . . ,:`. . . .. ./
. . . . . . /(_. . ”~,_. . . ..“~,_. . . . . . . . . .,:`. . . . _/
. . . .. .{.._$;_. . .”=,_. . . .“-,_. . . ,.-~-,}, .~”; /. .. .}
. . .. . .((. . .*~_. . . .”=-._. . .“;,,./`. . /” . . . ./. .. ../
. . . .. . .\`~,. . ..“~.,. . . . . . . . . ..`. . .}. . . . . . ../
. . . . . .(. ..`=-,,. . . .`. . . . . . . . . . . ..(. . . ;_,,-”
. . . . . ../.`~,. . ..`-.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..\. . /\
. . . . . . \`~.*-,. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..|,./.....\,__
,,_. . . . . }.>-._\. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .|. . . . . . ..`=~-,
. .. `=~-,_\_. . . `\,. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .\
. . . . . . . . . .`=~-,,.\,. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .\
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . `:,, . . . . . . . . . . . . . `\. . . . . . ..__
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .`=-,. . . . . . . . . .,%`>--==``
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . _\. . . . . ._,-%. . . ..`

Anyway. This is what happens when I try to write. I don't have the balls to let that poor wordplay just sit there, so I obsess over this for a while, and just don't care about it enough to continue/avoid distraction(in this case, messing with the beat I made, then moving on to reading this article about sidechaining). When I am a successful writer, I care enough about what I am writing to both actually have something to say AND be interested in thinking through the problems I come across. This doesn't happen very often. Thus I rarely practice, and do not improve at hurdling the problems I encounter. Then again, I think, if I don't have much to say, what's the point of saying it. Is it really worth making myself effective enough to portray ideas I wasn't invested in primarily? Why not just share what I DO think is important enough to share, the raw music I leave on the site, or force into your ears if you hang out with me.

It's at about this point in my thought process that the drum fill around the 3' mark of the song you're listening to happened. I stopped thinking about writing.



NB If you enjoyed this song, John in the Morning was killin it on KEXP: listen here.