Writing Lyrics - How Do You Do It?

[RockfordStone]

so my band is currently back into a full flow and are churning out a song or two a week musically.

the struggle i am currently having as the singer is writing lyrics. i used to be able to write lyrics for fun when i was younger, but for some reason i seem to be blocked.

i can make up melodies to the songs no problems, but words seemt to be evading me at the moment.

any one have any advice were to start or how to overcome my apparent inability to write anything?

[noelk27]

Sure, when inspiration strikes, it strikes. When it does, it helps to have a pen and paper with you (or the modern equivalents, such as a cellphone or other device that you can make oral notes). But, in the times when inspirations has taken a vacation, then there are a number of ways to get some flow going. Reading more can put some ideas in your head. Looking more, at what's going on around you, at the quirky or unusual, at the mundane and ordinary, can also start a trickle. There's the montage technique, of cutting up newspapers and magazines, putting the cuttings in a bowl, and pulling out fragments one by one and trying to link things together. There's the phonetics approach, so just making sounds along with the song you're writing, and then seeing what words match, and linking those words into themes. But, what I try to do, is find a minimum of 15 minutes in the day just to write any thoughts down (even if that's starting by writing "my mind is blank", "i don't know what to say") and finding one opportunity each week to review what you've penned that week. If you're lucky, you can end up with one or two lines, which can trigger an idea. You might just find you have to spend the time writing cr*p, simply to clean out your head, and get back into practice.

[xilddx]

It's not an easy thing to do. In fact good lyrics are very hard to write. I don't bother anymore, but when I did, I wrote about personal things and things about which I felt strongly, but mostly personal things I felt strongly about, if you get my drift.

Once you have a subject, you then need to express it in a way that reflects your personality. I'm a right ponce, so I like to express myself with florid and excessive forays into language and artifice according to my own whim. I'm also a depressing bastard, and vain but self-deprecatory, proud and self loathing. Battling constantly with self doubt and self importance, and at war with my own sense of the aesthetic and my presumed values. In short, I know a lot about myself and f*** all about myself. I also think I know what people want to hear, and how they want to hear it, but hopefully also make people think and question their own perspectives, and I seem to have a way of understanding dynamics in people.

All that sh*t you get from examining yourself and others, the world and its physical, philosophical and and emotional ecosystems, is stuff you want to put into lyrics.

But write a good sloganeering chorus lyric. All the clever and interesting stuff is for the verses

Edited March 2, 2012 by silddx

[xilddx]

Also, get a book called Songwriters on Songwriting. It will inspire you deeply I hope. It is a fascinating book!

Edited March 2, 2012 by silddx

[Truckstop]

Much like Nigel suggests, I take 10 or 15 minutes out each day to write Haikus. I find the subject matter by literally by turning on the TV and picking a word that someone's said. I used to write lyrics for my old band by expanding on them. You just gotta know when you're writing well, and when you're writing utter rubbish!

Too many adverts,
Just let me buy what I want!
Sadly, no money

As you can see, I'm going through a dry spell!

Truckstop

[lxxwj]

Meditate with a piece of paper in front of you while listening to music. Something hits me most of the time.
With this method, I find when I start writing it's just riffing off the song I'm listening to a lot, but after a few lines
something opens up and I can just write my feelings onto the page.

..Only problem is when I read it over afterwards I realize everything I wrote sucks.
Just rinse & repeat..

Edited March 2, 2012 by lxxwj

[thisnameistaken]

[quote name='silddx' timestamp='1330647347' post='1561103']All that sh*t you get from examining yourself and others, the world and its physical, philosophical and and emotional ecosystems, is stuff you want to put into lyrics.

But write a good sloganeering chorus lyric. All the clever and interesting stuff is for the verses [/quote]

+1000

I usually come up with hook lines in the shower or when I'm going to sleep, the rest of the words either come from slack time - waiting for public transport or, well, general waiting, but I've always been a real fan of words and using them to good effect so I really enjoy writing lyrics, so it never feels like work even if I have to sit down and do it.

I also use dictation software on my phone quite a lot for recording ideas for songs, couplets that pop into my head, melodies etc. Then every couple of weeks I play back all the recordings and decide which ones had merit, and if I still think any are good/clever I'll fire up Protools or Reason (or both) and do some proper work on it.

[WHUFC BASS]

Listen to the band "Blood For Blood" and you'll get a ton of inspiration from that.