Notes on Songwriting Pt???

An essay I never got around to posting because I’m sick and trying to catch up on novel draft edits. Have a lovely week y’all.

From September 10th, 2023

The cheap guitar sits in my room collecting dust. I move it around depending on whether or not it’s blocking my way, never with the intention of tuning and giving it a go. Not dared look at old guitar lesson videos and retrain my fingers to play the Pink Panther theme tune. It’s been a long while since I’ve sat on my bed playing the same three notes over and over again whilst staring into space.

The last lyric I wrote was two months ago, written down with the intention of making a whole song.

It’s Tuesday morning
I put down the glass
Hold your face in my head
A little hungover, making breakfast in bed
Light beams, the only colour left
Besides the redness, neck burnt from the Winter

These have since sat alone in a small notebook I carry around with me for the occasional doodle, usually when sat in the park. I still think I’m trying to be someone else when I write lyrics. Trying to be someone who’s “good”. Rather than whatever I feel like in the moment. If I open my notes app, it’s full of scattered thoughts, waiting to be put to song. But they are too disjointed, too messy. I feel like listening to emo music in my formative years has ruined lyric writing forever, I can’t seem to escape this moody, angst-ridden mind. When I try to approach lyrics from a more folk-like tone, it feels wrong. Inauthentic. But I think that’s because of how I see folk musicians. As wise, forest-dwelling old souls. When most of the time, they live in cities, living lives probably not too different from my own.

Lyric writing, I suppose, means you have to be in tune with your emotions or a want to be to some extent, using songwriting as a way to process them. It’s like a purging, getting it all out so it you can move on. Whilst I like to repress everything until I burst and others are left wondering why I am crying over a dirty spoon left in the sink. It’s something in the biz we call emotional regulation. We all find ways to express ourselves or the rot sets in. My mind is an incredibly messy room, a hoarder house, unable to let anything go for fear I’ll need it. I don’t even know if writing a song will make it better.

I know at heart, I am a songwriter. It was the first thing I ever did for myself. In some ways music for me is the most natural thing in the world. It matters to me more than film, art and literature combined. I think I’m scared of it because of that. Because it means so much to me, I worry I appear foolish before it. Look at my little notes about being sad! Look at this love song about no one! Isn’t my heartbreak profound?

I like to imagine songwriting as a figure in a white cloak, without judgement. Sitting on a stone wall, kicking its feet to whatever you play it. It just appreciates that you thought of it. It understands that words don’t always work quite right, that it is difficult to contain your feelings in a tune.

I hate how silly I feel about the things that matter to me. This polluting self-awareness. I cannot detach myself from it like a painting or a story. Lyricism you can’t hide behind, you have to wear it. And there’s nothing I hate more than expressing my own feelings. This hatred of emotion is such a hassle, maybe if I wrote more songs I wouldn’t think that so heavily.

I remember sitting in my room, 14 years old, pouring my heart into lyrics about how angry I was. Angry about being sad. Angry about being lonely. Angry about feeling confined. Angry about being misunderstood. One lyric I remembering writing during this time, I believe the song was called Emily, because it was a cool name for a 14 year old emo/goth kid to have (Emily Strange was very popular, the name Alice was another one). “If weeds can grow/And roses can die/Who am I to judge/How you look when you cry”. I don’t remember really what the song was about, the drama of it all, but I still like the lyrics because they are so earnest. Unfiltered by self-consciousness and not worried about what makes a good song. I was so sure of myself when I wrote back then. Being a teenager is being the most confident and self-conscious person all at once. You can write the most trite, sad, cringe songs because of how confused you feel and believe you are saying the most important thing in the world. And in that moment, for you, it is the most important thing in the world. How could it not be? Before social media, alone in your room, that was all life was. You wrote things to maybe share with your friends or on some niche message boards. Most of us weren’t playing gigs or had big plans of stardom. When I was a teen, I never liked singing loudly on stage, I didn’t want to draw attention to myself for fear of being bad. But alone in my room, I was loud and talented and the songwriter of a generation!

It wasn’t until I was a bit older that I realised, oh, I’m actually quite good at this whole singing thing. Musicals and covers were easy, getting bullied in youtube comments no issue, because I wasn’t singing my own words. I’m sure some of that stuff is still floating around on a server, like my ancient lyrics. But I never went for it. I’ve never really “gone for it” with anything. Not singing, writing, painting. What would it mean to fully commit to something, to push myself into a field, point to my work and ask “Doesn’t anyone understand?”. The worry is people not caring, isn’t it? To labour over something with love and craft only for people to not even bat an eye. That is what I find most terrifying about lyric writing, but isn’t that inevitable? Not everyone is going to care and why can’t that be freeing?

The guitar is still collecting dust. I can philosophise why I haven’t been writing for as long as I please. Always thinking about doing something is not the same as actually sitting your ass down and dealing with the frustration that is the creative process. I do love rambling about the creative process though. I love wondering why we do the things we do. I tend to be friends with creative people, not because I have some grudge again those who aren’t, but because I connect well with those who also put themselves through this process. It’s hard to explain to people who aren’t inclined. Why does art matter? It’s hard to explain to a person who doesn’t care. It’s the whole AI debate. Why is it not good enough that people love to make things? Why must it be quantified and be all about efficiency? If anything, one of the joys of making art is how inefficient it is. It’s taking the long way home just because. Well, the answer is money, obviously. It’s hard not to make it about money when you need to to...you know….survive. I like songwriting because I’m very sure I’ll never make money from it. There is something very freeing in that respect. But there’s a part of my mind thinking we should be working on the portfolio, the writing, things that might possibly, though not probably, make money. Songwriting costs me nothing and will make me nothing. I want to be the kind of person who gets by and does what they love with “the rest is up to god” type attitude. But I’m not doing that, the whole point of this essay is about how I’m not doing that. The guitar is collecting dust and I’m just imagining again.

My dad came to visit and picked up the guitar. It’s out of tune and sounded rough. But it was nice to hear the strings sing out again, there’s nothing quite like the sound of an acoustic guitar, even a rubbish one. It’s calling back to me. I crack my knuckles. I sit down on my bed and play three notes over and over, staring at the wall.

Thank you for reading,

Enya xx