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Tom O'Brien
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10/4/2020 1:54:19 AM
Why do you write?
If you're like me, your motivations for being a songwriter are multifarious. There's the obvious fame and fortune aspects, but I gave up on that long ago. I'm content to share my music with my friends, including you guys here. I write because things just kind of bubble up inside of me sometimes, phrases, lines, melodies, and they have to have an outlet. I've just been writing for so long that it has become just something I do. I have no kids, so I guess my songs are my kids. Writing is like being pregnant, and when the song is recorded and exists separately from me in the world, that's like its birth. And what kind of life it will have is anybody's guess. Some songs I play over and over - some songs I forget soon after recording them. I write because I want to celebrate music in the world - it is a magical, ancient part of us that I feel connected to, as if I have a responsibility to keep it alive. I write to communicate love. I write because I admire songwriters - we're a special breed. I write because I can. I write because I want to feel intimately connected with the music I play, and not just play other people's songs. Being able to play someone else's song is kind of like being a really fast and accurate typist - if the music is good, you're going to sound good. But if you're just a typist and can't compose a decent sentence, you don't have quite the same relationship to the music. So, while I admire a good instrumentalist, I admire a good writer more.I think vanity is also a reason to write. We all want to be liked.
Have you ever thought about your motivations as a songwriter?
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Mike Lance
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10/4/2020 9:08:27 AM
---- Updated 10/5/2020 9:32:02 AM
I think it's the escapism for me. I mean that both in the sense that it puts my mind to something productive when life gets heavy, but also the simple transportative quality of music. I like songs with an atmosphere that whisk you away, and to create one is to inhabit that place for a while. Even a simple acoustic ditty can do this with the right emotion or lyrical imagery.
And then there's the high you get when a song is finished and you play it back in awe of having created it.
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Mike Lance
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10/4/2020 9:18:18 AM
Also, it's damn fun to do.
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Richard Scotti
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10/4/2020 2:08:45 PM
---- Updated 10/4/2020 2:09:32 PM
The Beatles had a profound influence on my life. They were so accessible and down to earth. They we're doing something amazing but they made it look easy and above all they made it seem like fun. They set an example for lost kids like me who didn't want to be tied down to a 9 to 5 job and longed for a creative outlet that had a humanitarian aspect to it. I thought "Hey, I can do that!". I had been a musician before I was a songwriter but had not attempted to write a song. One night I wrote my first song. It just popped into my head and didn't sound like any of the cover songs I was playing with my band. It felt original like something I had never heard before and it blew my mind. I felt like I found myself. I was no longer lost. I played the song for others and they really liked it which blew my mind even further. It's so exciting to create something from scratch, something that never existed before. Not everyone can do that which makes it seem even more like an exclusive club.
I've always been very interested in magic and learned to do some tricks. Music is very much like magic for me. It's all about creating an illusion that people are fascinated, entertained or amused by. You conjure up images right before their eyes and it's a very validating experience. I always looked at John and Paul as musician/magicians because the question would always arise: "How the hell do they do that?"
Like Tom inferred, the notions of fame and fortune are nothing but illusions themselves but I would say that I do aspire to keep sharing my work with the people on this website and beyond and with anyone who will listen because I feel a need to spread as much positivity as I can into a world that desperately needs it. My songs are about peace, love, redemption, forgiveness, hope, equality, mercy, unity and hopefully more, perhaps whatever you think they are about. I'm more of a teacher than a preacher.
I feel a need to celebrate a certain kind of music and song to keep them from becoming obsolete. I'm like an ambassador whose job it is to represent and promote a wonderful tradition. It's a responsibility I take very seriously but it's also a hell of a lot of fun!!
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Larree
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10/4/2020 6:20:02 PM
I don't know. For me, it's just another bodily function.
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Bob Elliott
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10/4/2020 7:30:52 PM
The question right now is why DON'T I write, and the answer is I'm completely buried in work.
But the reason I do write when I can is a desire that never quits and is oblivious to outer circumstance. There really are no other factors to explain given that I just want to so much.
I don't agree that playing covers is like taking dictation. A person can flow with just as much creativity interpreting covers, too.
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Father Time
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10/5/2020 7:37:12 AM
I wrote my first song in high school, about a girl I liked, it was called Kris. I think I started writing simply because I was musical and I could. Early on I set myself on a course to try to write and would just tape my musical ramblings for hours. At least the last 20 years I write when an interesting phrase comes in my head and i think well there's a song.
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Shoe City Sound
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10/7/2020 3:24:46 PM
I've thought a lot about this - great question - never asked myself before. I would have to say I write because I need to hear these particular sounds. I don't mean this in any egotistical way - far from it! And where would I be without the sounds that all other writers have created! But when I listen back to our tunes, they make the atmosphere feel like home to me - one of the few places that makes it feel safe to breathe. And that particular world doesn't exist any where else.
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Bob Elliott
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10/9/2020 4:42:12 PM
So true, Shoe
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